Wilson, Joseph beaten in Cadet main draw

T&T’s Aaron Wilson and Brittany Joseph failed to pick up silverware on the final day of the eighth International Table Tennis Federation’s  Junior & Cadet Open Championship in San Salvador, yesterday. The 14-year-old Wilson was beaten by Venezuelan Jan Medina in their round-of-32 encounter, 3-11, 13-11, 9-11, 11-8, 4-11, 11-13. On Saturday, he went under to New Zealand's Kevin Wu (9-11, 7-11, 4-11), but responded with wins against El Salvador's Christian Villeda (11-3, 11-2, 11-2)  and Puerto Rican Francisco Matias (11-1, 11-2, 11-3 ) in Group Five to reach the main draw knockout stage. Also on Saturday, Wilson competing in a four-player Cadet Boys Group Ten series, whipped El Salvadorean duo, Rodrigo Morales 11-4, 11-5 11-1 and Harold Leiva 11-5, 11-8, 11-6 in his first two matches. 

 

 

However, in the group decider with India's Anirban Ghosh, Wilson was beaten 3-11, 8-11, 9-11 and had to settle for the second qualifying spot before losing to Sweden's Elias Sibelius by walkover in the main-draw knockout stage due to a scheduling mix-up. Arun Roopnarine was also absent from the venue when his main draw knockout clash with Sweden's William Olivius was called resulting in a default loss. Earlier on, Roopnarine, suffered a straight sets loss to India’s Aarsh Shah 5-11, 5-11, 9-11 in his Group opener  before he rebounded to defeat Sweden’s William Apelquist 11-9, 7-11, 11-7, 11-8 and El Salvador’s Oscar Villata 11-4, 11-8, 8-11, 11-7 to reach the main draw as the second place finisher in his group. Joseph meanwhile fell at the hands of India's Priyadarshini Das in her last-16 match in straight sets.  Joseph overcame El Salvador’s Monica Mendoza 11-8, 11-5 6-11, 11-8 in her second Group One match to reach the main draw, after losing her opener to group winner, India’s Ayhika Mukherjee 4-11, 4-11, 2-11 and 1-11, 5-11, 4-11.

 

 

Joseph and Roopnarine also competed in the Junior Girls and Boys Singles but did not advance beyond the round-robin groups. Competing in Group Eight, Joseph was third after losses to Mukherjee (5-11, 1-11, 5-11) and Chines Taipei's Chia-Yun Kuo (6-11, 2-11, 3-11) before overcoming El Salvador’s Karla Palma (11-2, 11-5, 11-2) for a 1-2 record. And in Group Seven, Roopnarine proved no match for Sweden's Jonas Stener (3-11, 7-11, 9-11), and Cuban, Livan Martinez (3-11, 6-11, 6-11) while he whipped home town player  Rene Quan (11-6, 11-4, 11-8). The Cadet doubles pairing of  Wilson and Roopnarine was ousted in their first match, in the round-of-16, by Martinez (Cuba)/Johan Hesselgren (Sweden) 11-8, 7-11, 9-11, 9-11, and the T&T/USA Cadet Girls combination of Joseph and Ishana Deb was also defeated at the same stage by Puerto Ricans Gabriela Diaz and Caroline Resto, 7-11, 7-11, 7-11. 

The tournament concluded last night after which Joseph and Roopnarine will link up with the senior national team for the Senior Caribbean Championships carded for Dominican Republic.