Kuwaits sixth International Table Tennis Championship (Salwa Cup) 22/2/2010
The Kuwaits sixth International Table Tennis Championship (Salwa Cup) will kick off tonight during the official opening at 8:00pm at the Salwa Hall in Marina. This championship is hold under the patronage of H.H. the Amir Sheikh Sabah Al-Ahmad. This championship is listed on the international agenda of table tennis championships and tournaments. Holding the Salwa Cup overcame the sports crisis in Kuwait. The opening ceremony will be attended by the Minister of Social Affairs and Labor Mohammed Al-Afasi. The theatre of Salwa Hall in Marina was prepared with the modern technical equipments including the lights, laser show, fireworks, to lighten the sky of Kuwait and announce the launching of Salwa Cup. The opening ceremony will be broadcasted live on the Third Channel of the KTV. The championship will be hold from February 32 – 27, 2010 and 38 countries are participating with 289 players from both males and females, with administrative and technical teams. The first competition will be held today at 9:00am at the Fajhan Hilal Al-Mutairi Hall at the Qadisiya Sports Club in Hawalli. It will start with the preliminary matches for two categories the single men and single under 21, which will continue till 8:00 pm to know who qualified for the round 64, and waiting for the participation of the 32 top world champions during the next rounds of this championship. Sheikh Talal Al-Fahad, the Head of the Higher Organizing Committee of the Championship and the President of the Qadsiya Sports Club invited the fans of the table tennis to attend the event of the 6th Salwa Cup. This year there will be many surprises in this championship and some changes as well. Every year this championship is improving more till it reached this high level. I would like to thank all the committees working on this Championship and all the sponsoring and supporting companies, he noted. Mohammed Al-Matouq the President of the Table Tennis Federation and the Deputy of the Higher Organizing Committee welcomed all participating teams. He also thanked all the officials working and supporting this championship. “This championship is one of the biggest table tennis championships held internationally. The cash prizes for the Salwa Cup are set at USD 300,000 for all the categories, he said. The Head of the Competitions Committee at the International Table Tennis Federation Khalid Al-Salihi praised the high standard of the Salwa Cup. “It became one of the special and big international table tennis championship especially for its high financial prizes, in addition to the participation of the top world champions. Also Kuwait has many good champions in this game such as Ibrahim Al-Hasan, he stated. The Kuwait young player Mishari Al-Bannay is glad to be participating with the Kuwaiti national team in this championship. “This is my first time to be participating in such big international championship with all those top world champions. I aim to gain more experience by playing with those champions,he pointed out.