São Paulo – Brazilian table tennis athlete Hugo Calderano (pictured above) defeated his fellow countryman Gustavo Tsuboi in the first round of the WTT Contender in Doha, Qatar and moved into the round of 16 of the first major table tennis event in the year.
After a balanced match on Wednesday (3), Calderano beat Tsuboi 3 to 1 at 12-8, 8-11, 12-10. Currently ranked 6th worldwide, Calderano is the only Brazilian to remain in the competition.
Calderano’s next game will be with South Korea’s Jaehyun An on a date and time yet to be set. The games are being streamed on the WTT’s channel on YouTube.
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This Wednesday, Tsuboi will join forces with his fellow countryman Vitor Ishiy. They will play Spain’s Alvaro Robles and Romenia’s Ovidiu Ionescu. After a promising campaign in the Preliminary stage, Ishiy was eliminated last night (2) after a close game against Italy’s Michail Bobocica. The Brazilian lost 3 to 1 at 10-12, 12-10, 11-3, 5-11, 4-11.
In the women’s tournament, São Paulo’s Bruna Takahashi, the number 2 in Brazil, left the competition early after losing to Ukraine’s Ganna Gaponova 3 to 0 at 11-5, 11-9, 11-6.
Translated by Guilherme Miranda
