My performance against England has boosted my confidence – Omotayo

If there is any athlete that believes competing at the Gold Coast Commonwealth Games has boosted his confidence at the top level, it is 22-year-old Olajide Omotayo.

Omotayo, a member of the silver winning table tennis men’s team told SportingLife.ng yesterday that he was still in cloud nine over his performance against England’s Liam Pitchford.

Despite losing in a close battle against the highly-rated Englishman, Omotayo showed his class matching his opponent shot-for-shot and strokes-for-strokes but it was Pitchford that won at 3-2.

Against Pitchford in one of the four singles matches played in Nigeria’s 3-2 win over England in the semifinal tie, Omotayo fought well against Pitchford when he won the first game at 11-9 but the Briton fought back with 11-4, 11-8 win to lead at 2-1.

Omotayo levelled up in the fourth game to win at 11-9. And despite starting the fifth game very well, Omotayo fell back to the English to race to 11-5 win.

However, a satisfied Omotayo said: “I feel happy and excited being part of this team. It has not been easy right from day one but I give God the glory that we made it to the final. It was a great achievement defeating the English team which I was able to play a top class player as well as Liam Pitchford.”

“I learnt a lot from each and everyone in the team most especially from Bode Abiodun who did a good job in Gold Coast,” he added.

Omotayo will now partner Abiodun in the men’s doubles as they battle their Pakistan counterparts in the first round (round of 32) earlier today.