Top seeds Matthew Kuti and Sukurat Aiyelabegan have set their sights on success as they prepare to compete in the 56th Molade Okoya Thomas National Table Tennis Championship.
Kuti, a silver medallist at the 2023 African Games, is coming into the competition with strong momentum after a dominant run in recent months. He however remains cautious about complacency.
“I have been playing well in the last two months, winning the majority of the competitions. But I don’t want to be too complacent; I will give my best to prove myself when it matters most. This is the gathering of the best players in the country, being the first national tournament in 2025,” Kuti said.

Aiyelabegan also acknowledged the intensity of the competition but is confident in her ability to rise to the occasion.
“We have the best players competing here, and it is really a tough tournament. I am confident I can raise my game to win the title in Lagos,” she stated.
Meanwhile, former Congolese international Saka Suraju, who has a long history with the event, praised the family of the tournament’s initiator, Chief Molade Okoya-Thomas, for preserving its legacy.
“In the 1990s, I reached the final but lost to Hakeem Hassan. Back then, only the best players in the country competed. This tournament has propelled many Nigerian players to stardom, as it was a gathering of the nation’s finest. If you aspired to join the national team, you had to compete in the Molade Okoya-Thomas Cup. I’m pleased that the tournament continues even after Chief Okoya-Thomas’s passing,” Suraju recalled.
The quarterfinals of the men’s and women’s singles will take place on Friday, January 31, while the final matches are set for Saturday, February 1.
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