Nigeria beat Egypt to Rio 2016 spot
Nigeria have beaten Egypt to Africa’s
sole qualification spot for the table tennis men’s team event of the Rio
2016 Olympic Games in Brazil.
But the Egyptians took the sole ticket
on the continent for the women’s team event of the Games ahead of their
West African rivals.
According to the May rankings released
by the International Table Tennis Federation on Thursday, Nigeria’s men
dropped from 26th to 27th with 202 points while the North Africans have
192 points to rank 32nd in the world.
According to qualification format, the
May 2016 Olympic Team Ranking list is taken into consideration for the
team selections at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games. Thus making Nigeria among
the 16 men’s teams that will compete at the Games.
However, Egypt beat Nigeria to the slot
in the women’s team event as they were ranked 31st in the world ahead
of Nigeria who ranked 39th. For the second time, Egypt has edged out
Nigeria from the women’s team event of the Olympics after their maiden
appearance in the team event of the London 2012 Olympic Games.
Meanwhile, the President of Africa Table
Tennis Federation, Khaled El-Salhy, in a statement on Thursday,
confirmed the development. But he said that ITTF would officially
announce the list of qualified teams in few days.
“The ITTF has not announced the list of
qualified teams yet but I believe that it should be done within the
coming 48 hours, but according to the rules for Olympic Games Team
events, each continent is entitled to at least one entry for team
event,” he said.
“For Africa Men’s Team, it will be
Nigeria as per position (27) compared with the other African teams,
Egypt (32) and Congo Brazzaville (35), while for the Women’s Team, it
will be Egypt as per position (31) compared with the other Africa teams,
Nigeria (39) and Algeria (66).
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