Nigeria table tennis icon, Segun Toriola, has been eliminated from the male singles event of the Rio Olympic Games.
Toriola, 41, appearing at his seventh Olympics, is the most by any African with his first coming at the 1992 edition in Barcelona.
The two-time Commonwealth gold medallist crashed 4-2 to Japanese challenger, Niwa Koki, on Sunday.
Toriola started brightly, beating Koki 9-11 in the first set before the Japanese rallied back to dominate the second set 11-5.
Koki continued his dominance by winning the next set 11-7 before Toriola triumphed in the fourth set leaving scores at 4-11.
At that point, it appeared the Nigerian would overpower his challenger for the rest of the match.
But Koki countered Toriola, wining the fifth and sixth sets by 11-6 and 11-1 respectively.
Toriola becomes the third Nigerian to crash out of the tournament after Team Nigeria deputy skipper, Funke Oshonaike, and Edem Offiong suffered shocking first round exits on Saturday.
Oshonaike was embarrassed 2-4 by 15-year-old Adriana Diaz of Puerto Rico while Offiong lost 1-4 to Viktoria Pavlovich of Belarus.
