Nigeria para-badminton player, Mariam Bolaji has won her maiden game in SL3 badminton appearance at the 2024 Paralympics in Paris.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that Bolaji defeated Mandeep Kaur (India) (21-8, 21-14) to record a 2-0 win in the women’s badminton event.
Bolaji, who is the SL3 World Number 2, told NAN on Thursday in Paris, that the victory had boosted her morale.
Bolaji also informed NAN that she was no longer afraid of any of her opponents in the games.
The SL3 World Number 2 will face her yet to be known Australian counterpart at 8:30a.m local time on Friday.
In another development, Chigozie Jeremiah (Nigeria), who recorded 2-0 win in the first set over his German counterpart Marcel Adam lost in the men’s SL4 para badminton second set on Thursday.
However, in a reversal of fortunes, Team Nigeria’s para-table tennis players had a torrid time on Thursday as they lost their matches in two events of their competition at the 2024 Paralympic Games in Paris.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the pair of Kayode Alabi and Faith Obazuaye lost 1-3 in the mixed doubles XD17 event.
They lost 6-11 11-7 6-11 6-11 to the pair of Joshua Stacey and Bly Twomey from Great Britain in their Round of 32 game.
Also, the Chinese pair of Peng Weinan and Huang Jiaxin beat the Nigerian pair of Alabi and Victor Farinloye 3-0 in the men’s doubles competition.
They won 11-9 11-5 118 in the MD14 event’s round of 16 fixtures.
Team Nigeria will now have to hope for honours from the singles events at the competition, following this early exit.