Unbeaten Quadri lifts third league title with Sporting

Since joining Sporting three seasons ago, Aruna Quadri remains the only player in the Lisbon –based team to maintain 100 percent unbeaten record which has also fetched the Nigerian this year’s Portuguese League title at the weekend.

This will be the third season that Sporting will cart away all the three titles at stake in the Portuguese elite table tennis League – League, Portugal and Super Cups and in this history making team are two Nigerians – Quadri and Bode Abiodun.

Since moving to Portugal in 2010, Aruna Quadri has won 18 titles having won nine titles with his former club – GD Toledos before teaming up with Sporting in 2015 where had also won nine titles made up of three cups per season. He has remained unbeaten with 20 league matches per season.

To be crowned the league champion at the weekend, Sporting defeated CD São Roque 3-0, in the second leg of the play-off Final, at the Estadio Multiusos Pavilion José Alvalade.

The Sporting team known as the “leonina” team had already won the first leg 3-1 in a match that took place in Funchal. This year’s title is the 35th title to be won by Sporting in the Portuguese Division One of Men’s National League. The venue of the second leg in Lisbon – Pavilhão de Alvalade was filled with fans that supported the team throughout the match. In the first game, the pair formed by Aruna Quadri and Diogo Carvalho had no problem beating the duo of Nuno Henriques and Zhao Tianming 3-0. Sporting’s João Monteiro returned to play against Zhao Tianming and after losing in the first leg in Madeira, Monteiro nearly faced same difficulties but the Portuguese international needed five sets to win the Chinese star. Quadri dismantled Tiago Li 3-0 to complete the 3-0 rout by Sporting.

The trophy was presented by the President of the Portuguese Table Tennis Federation, Pedro Miguel Moura, and the chairman of the General Assembly Board, Inês Louro.

Apart from the league title, Sporting remains the only side in Portugal to have featured in the ETTU Champions League and also set a new record of making it to the semifinal stage of the lucrative tournament.