The adventure of Nigeria’s trio of Joseph Imeh, Sylvester Emmanuel and Christian Paul, at the ongoing ITF Futures in Uganda, ended on a sad note, even though the players put up series of fights in their matches.
The Nigerian players were billed to play their singles matches on Tuesday, 22 May, 2018, alongside the other doubles match, with expectations really high for positive results, but they were not so fortunate in their matches.
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| Nigerian players lost all their matches at the ongoing Uganda ITF Futures on Tuesday, 22 May, 2018. |
Christian and Imeh were not lucky in their doubles encounter on Monday, as they lost out in two straight sets, but were unperturbed, as they looked forward to their individual matches at the Lugogo Tennis Club, Kampala. But they would rather forget it in a hurry after losing out.
Imeh, the Nigerian number one player, put up a serious fight against Boris Aguma, his opponent from Uganda but lost 2-6, 3-6 in one of the early matches of the day. Sylvester on the other hand, had a more tedious game, as Prajwal Dev, the 21-year-old number eight seed from India dealt him a serious blow; defeating him 6-2, 6-0.
According to Nigerian Tennis Live checks, the Nigerian stars hoped for a better fortune but Christian couldn’t break the barrier, as he also lost in two straight sets of 2-6, 1-6 to Du Toit Lance-Pierre from South Africa.
In the team event that involved Sylvester – popularly referred to as Major, the Nigerian star, alongside his partner, Johansson Niklass, put up a virtuoso performance, but could not overpower Munos-Abreu Jordi and Perez Sanz David the tournament’s number one seed.
The results all but ended Nigeria’s chances of continuing at the tournament as attention will now be shifted to the Davis Cup which will take place in June.