Ghana recorded its first ever win at the ITTF World Championships as the duo of Derek Abrefa and Celia Baah-Danso defeated Mauritius’ duo of ARNACHELLUM Allan & RAMASAWMY Caroline 3-1 in the preliminary round of the mixed doubles event.
Playing on centre court at HungExpo in Budapest, the Ghanaian pairs who are combining for the first time in an international tournament toppled their Mauritian counterpart with 11-8, 8-11, 11-9, 13-11 to advance to the next stage of the competition.
An excited Derek Abrefa said he hopes to record more wins but admitted that it would be a Herculean task in Budapest.
“It was indeed a good feeling coming back to the biggest competition in the world. I was so excited when I learnt that we will be playing on table one and I just told my partner that we should go in there and give our best. We were familiar with our opponents but we knew it was a different platform and we have to make ourselves and country proud by winning the first match for Ghana in a World Championship in recent times. We are aware that we will be facing stronger opponents as we advance but we will continue to work harder and play harder,” said Abrefa.
For Celia Baah-Danso, it was an experience she would not want to forget in a hurry. “I am very much happy featuring in my first World Championship and specially playing on the centre court where the whole world will be watching me. I am also happy that we were able to win the first match and this is awesome and I can’t wait to play the next game. It was a different feeling for me playing on table one where all the cameras focused on you. I hope the experience I garner will be helpful to me in all the competitions I will be playing this year,” she said.
However, Celia Baah-Danso did not start well in the women’s singles as she fell 4-0 to her Indian counterpart.
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