Badminton player Nhat Nguyen from Dublin dominated in today’s second group play stage of the men’s singles while Dublin’s Georgia Drummey put on an assured display in the first round of the women’s singles also beating her first opponent of the tournament.
Badminton:
Nhat Nguyen from Dublin took on local opponent Matteo Delmastro in his second men’s singles group play match. Nguyen won the first game comfortably 21-8, and then eased past Delmastro 21-5 in the second game to claim the match in an assured display.
Commenting on the performance, Nhat’s coach, John Quinn said; “As expected, it was quite a simple game with Nhat wining 21-8, 21-5, and sets him up for tomorrow’s match where he’ll play a boy from El Salvador to see who will qualify for the last eight of the tournament. Nhat plays again today in the team event, so he’ll be back in the hall for competition at 7.30pm tonight.”
Tennis
Georgia Drummy beat Valentina Ivanov (NZL) in the first round of the women’s singles by 2-1. The Dubliner dominated the first half of the match, with a lead of 6-0, 4-0 at one stage. Ivanov fought back to win the second set 7-5. The final set was a tight battle before Drummy took the overall win with 6-3 in the final set.
Following competition, Georgia said; “I was up in the second set pretty easy, I was playing really well until then, then she [Valentina] fought pretty hard and she got back into it. I lost the second set, and I just went off court, tried to regroup and not think about being up at all – because then I got a bit nervous, and I was thinking ‘I need this’ so I just pretended it was a new match and I went out for the third set and I played better.”
The evening session of Day Two at the Youth Olympic Games will see Nhat in action once again in the relay team group play event, Galway’s Emma Slevin in the women’s vault qualification and Sligo’s Mona McSharry and Dublin’s Niamh Coyne in the 50m women’s breaststroke final.
Day three of the Youth Olympic games bring Nhat back to the court again for the third group play stage of the men’s singles, Galway’s David Kitt and Dublin’s Lauren Crowley Walsh will take to the green for the men’s and women’s golf individuals respectively. Dublin’s Niamh Coyne and Sligo’s Mona McSharry will compete in the women’s 100m breaststroke while Athlone man Robert Powell takes to the pool for the men’s 50m free. Emma Slevin will take to the floor for the women’s uneven bars later in the day.
Team Ireland in Buenos Aires comprises of a squad of 16 athletes from 9 sports. The team of 5 male athletes and 11 female athletes includes Nhat Nguyen (Badminton) and Mona McSharry (Swimming), recipients of Olympic Solidarity Scholarships which were awarded to assist with qualification and preparations for the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games.This is the third edition of the Youth Olympic Games which are hosted every four years. The Games, running from October 6 to October 18 will feature more than 4,000 talented junior athletes aged 15 to 18 from 200 countries in over 32 sports.