Bonolo Mabote’s winning streak in the inaugural Botswana Table Tennis Association (BTTA) came to a halt at the weekend as he lost his first game of the league. The BTTA league log leader finally crashed to a 4-2 defeat at the hands of Kennete Santudu on Saturday.
After nine successive wins, Mabote seemed on course to continue his winning streak after he won his first game of the day against as he beat Tshoka Phiri in four straight sets.
However, things were to change in his second game of the day as Mabote lost a match to a resurgent and resilient Santudu. The latter fought back from a 2-1 deficit to convincingly beat Mabote.
Santudu had a better start to the game, winning the first set of the duo’s encounter 12-10. Mabote however bounced back from the setback and looked on course to win the match as he went on to clinch the second and third sets of the encounter 11-8 and 15-13 respectively.
Santudu however had other ideas as he rallied back to win the next three consecutive sets to hand Mabote his first loss of the league season. Despite the loss, Mabote is still at the top of the league log, being the only player in the men’s section to have lost a single game.
Meanwhile, in the ladies’ section, it is still all to play for between the country’s two highly ranked players Boitshwarelo Butale and Matshidiso Osi. The two ladies are currently neck to neck in the title race, each having won nine games and losing only one each.
In what is proving an interesting race for the ladies league honours, both players won their games this past weekend to keep things tight at the top of the log standings. Butale, who is ranked number on locally and is the current BTTA league leader, beat Salome Matlhatsi in four straight sets before beating Phemelo Gaborapelwe 4 -1.
On the other hand her nemesis Osi, who is ranked number two player locally and is also sitting on position two in the log beat Namibo Mbulawa 4-1 to ensure she keeps her challenge for honours alive.
