Accra
(Greater Accra) 06 September 2000
The
national doubles pair of Courage Anyidoho and Gunther Dake, on Tuesday, failed
to progress to the next stage of the doubles event at the on-going ITF Africa
Satellite circuit table tennis competition in Accra.
They went
down 7-5, 4-6, 6-4 to James Aukland of Britian and Daniel Norberg of Sweden.
It was the
Ghanaians who started stronger, as they easily won their serve and forced their
opponents to double duce on theirs.
The
Ghanaians' could not sustain the early pressure as they were broken in the
fourth serve with powerful groundstrokes and beautiful across court passing
shots.
They came
back strongly in the 9th serve, broke the opponents serve with good attacking
play, especially at the net after they seemed to have found an antidote to the
fast serves of Norberg.
However,
this break could not propelled them into winning the first set as they allowed
their opponents to break again in the 12th serve to end the first set at 5-7.
The
Ghanaians rallied in the second set and won all their serves breaking the
opponents' in the 5th serve to win 6-4.
In the
final set the Ghanaians interestingly lost their focus as they started
challenging the umpire's calls and committed errors, particularly, on the part
of Courage.
Their
opponents capitalised on this and broke their serve in the 10th serve after
they had all won their previous serves to win 4-6.
Earlier, in
another doubles encounter, the Ghanaian pair George Afarku and Thomas Debrah
beat Ghedina Giunior of Germany and Ryan Thompson of the USA 6-7, 6-2, 7-6.
The second
round of the men's singles continues on Wednesday with the tournament's top
seed Radim Zitko of Czech Republic playing Tamba Samassa from Mali, while
Gunther Darkey faces Nigeria's Sunday Maku and Courage Anyidoho pairs up with
South Africa's Stegmann Dirk.
GRi…/
Accra
(Greater Accra) 06 September 2000
La Old
Stars fought back strongly in the dying minutes to pip Accra Old Stars 1 -0 in
their 4th week Oldies soccer league competition at La Town Park over the
weekend.
The
visitors, carried the game to their hosts and nearly took the lead in the,
fifth and 12th minutes, but La goalkeeper, Larsey Trafalgon made brilliant
saves of shots fired by schemer Nii Lante Vanderpuye and speedsters Santrofi
Acquah, formerly of Accra Hearts of Oak.
The
visitors disorganised the homers with their perfect one-touch style of play and
succeeded in pinning them to their own half of the field.
The tide
changed in favour of La, when Sowah Abaa and Francis Mantey were brought into
their attacking line.
In one of
their raids, nimble footed Ben Koyede, in a good position to score, was upended
in the box for a penalty that was utilised byAmankwa Fenymore for the only goal
of the match.
In another
match in the series, Hon E.T. Mensah led Teshie Old Star to draw 2 - 2 with
Scrap Rangers at the Accra Technical Training Centre Park.
GRi…/