South Africa won both the men’s and women’s events for the third time since 2015 as the 2024 BNP Paribas World Team Cup African Qualification came to a conclusion over the weekend in Abuja, Nigeria after a record-breaking week for the ITF’s flagship wheelchair tennis team event.

This year's African Qualification set a regional record of 10 nations and 16 teams participating across the men’s and women’s draws, with South Africa, Morocco and host nation Nigeria easing through their respective men’s round-robin groups unbeaten and Rwanda, second in their group to top seeds Morocco, also progressing to the men’s semi-finals.

Former world No.11 Eliphas Evans Maripa arrived in Abuja having not played a tournament since the end of July 2022. So with only reigning African Para Games champion Alwande Sikhosana having a world ranking  among South Africa’s two selected players, South Africa started the week as men’s seventh seeds.

However, the combined experience of Maripa and Sikhosana was more than enough to help South Africa past Rwanda’s Emmanuel Hakizimana and Jean Luc Dusengiamana 2-0 after not dropping a game in either singles match in the semi-finals.

Meanwhile, Morocco’s biggest challenge in the semi-finals came when Nigeria’s Terlumun Ukari took Lhaj Boukartacha to a second set tie-break in their second singles match, but Boukartacha came through 6-2 7-6(4) to take the top seeds and two-time African Qualification winners into the final.

Maripa prepared for his return to World Team Cup competition by beating Morocco’s Said Himam and Fouad Boughnim in the semi-finals and final at the Vemp Wheelchair International Open in Abuja and Maripa again faced Himam in the African Qualification final, winning 6-3 7-5 before Sikhosana raced past Boukartacha 6-1 6-1 to wrap up another 2-0 victory and ensure South Africa’s return to the  BNP Paribas World Team Cup World Group in Turkey in May.

Sikhosana said: “I feel great to be able to produce a great performance that helpd our team go to Turkey. It’s not the biggest achievement for now, because it is the first stage to see how we perform on the world stage. There's so much that we have to work on to play even stronger in Turkey.

“It might have not been easy for me to win, but it was definitely challenging. It required a lot mental and physical strength for me to be able to win here.”

Montjane, Venter secure qualification for South Africa women

By far the highest ranked of the 43 players from the 16 teams gathered in Abuja, women’s world No. 8 Kgothatso Montjane acknowledged that third seeds South Africa were arguably the favourites for the women’s event but would be taking nothing for granted against any of their opponents.

Seeded behind Morocco and Kenya, Montjane and Mariska Venter won all of their respective round-robin group ties 3-0 without dropping a single game against either Kenya,  Egypt or group runners-up Tanzania. 

However, host nation Nigeria ensured that top seeds Morocco didn’t have things all their own way in their round-robin group, the tie between the two nations coming down to a deciding match tie-break in the crucial doubles rubber before Najwa Awane and Samira Benichi beat Kemi Oluwasegun and Kafayat Omisore 7-6(3) 3-6 (10-8).

But, with Morocco and Nigeria finishing in the top two positions in the group they progressed to the last four before Morocco beat Tanzania 2-0 and South Africa beat Nigeria 2-0.

With Venter riding the crest of a wave after beating Awane a few days earlier on her way to winning the Vemp Wheelchair International Open women’s singles title, the South African No. 2 defeated Benichi 6-1 6-1 to end her time in Abuja on a high and give South Africa the lead in the final. Thereafter, Montjane completed a dominant week for South Africa, defeating reigning African Para Games gold medallist Awane 6-3 6-0 to wrap up a 2-0 victory.

“Obviously we came to Nigeria with the purpose for both teams to qualify, and it makes us happy that we have qualified,” said South Africa’s delighted coach Patrick Selepe.

“What we have to do now is to fight so that we can remain in the World Goup so that other African teams can come to join us. We dropped from the World Group because we were out of the top rankings (in 2023) required to remain there.

“This event is very important because we don’t have so many events in Africa. You see improvements every year if we have many tournaments. For instance, I never thought Tanzania would be winning against Kenya and play the way they played, but that's the improvement I was talking about. The more we play competitions like this, the better our teams in Africa become.

“We need to have a camp whereby the best players can be in camp and work on their play. And if we can have more tournaments, we will improve our play.”

Moroccan coach Smail Rebber was philosophical in defeat after two runners-up placings. He said:

“Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. I’m happy for my players because we made a lot of progress in the course of the competition. It’s like a win for us even though we did not qualify for the World Team Cup main event. We’ll just have to keep working hard to reach our next target.”