Pickard and Twomey take bronze in women’s doubles
Paralympic debutants Fliss Pickard and Bly Twomey secured a bronze medal in the women’s class 14 doubles in Paris today after losing their semi-final to the Asian Para Games champions from China. Twomey is through to the quarterfinals of mixed class 17 tomorrow with Joshua Stacey while Megan Shackleton and Tom Matthews produced a good performance to beat Australia before losing to Germany in the last 16 of mixed class 7.
Women’s class 14 semi-final
Fliss Pickard and Bly Twomey faced the Asian Para Games champions class 8 World number two Huang Wengjuan and class 6 world number 12 Jin Yucheng from China and made a superb start, taking the first set 11-6. Huang and Jin came back to win the second 11-6 and with Huang using her powerful forehand to good effect the Chinese pair raced through the third set 11-3
“They are an unbelievably strong pair,” said Pickard, “and they don’t go to a lot of tournaments, so we don’t get a lot of exposure to them. This is only going to make us stronger, and I think we were right there with them and we gave a good account of ourselves and we can be very proud of that. It hasn’t really sunk in yet that we’ve won a medal. I’ll maybe give myself some time to try and enjoy it with the rest of the team because I wouldn’t have been here without the rest of them pushing me all the way. It’s been a long journey, but I’m so pleased to be here.”
Fourteen-year-old Twomey has taken everything in her stride on her Paralympic debut.
“I just take it all in and believe the crowd are cheering for us,” she said. “It feels amazing to play in a Paralympic semi-final. If you’d told me a year ago that I’d be going to the Paris Paralympics and getting a bronze medal with Fliss I wouldn’t have believed it. I’m just really proud to be here with Fliss and to be here with Andrew (coach Andrew Rushton). It’s been amazing.”
Mixed class 17
After their first-round win against Nigeria Joshua Stacey and Bly Twomey faced the imposing class 10 World number one Patryk Chojnowski and class 6 former World champion Katarzyna Marszal from Poland in the last 16 and they played superbly to win 3-0 (11-6 11-6 11-9) and go through to the quarterfinal tomorrow.
“We had a definite game plan,” said Stacey. “With Bly playing Marszal in Singapore a few months ago she found that her forehand was a lot weaker than any other part of her game so if Patryk gave me a ball I could take a slight risk on I made sure I hit the ball into that area and it paid off. Obviously, this morning was disappointing with Aaron but it’s such minute details in table tennis and things didn’t go our way, but the last two matches probably have so it’s a funny old sport and this time I’m glad to be on the right side of things.”
“He (Chojnowski) is very tall,” said Bly, “and very powerful but I just played my game. Josh is a very inspiring person and I’m very pleased to play with him. I just think whenever I am on the table I know he is going to attack the next ball so I’m excited about tomorrow.”
Mixed class 7
Class 1 Tom Matthews and class 4 Megan Shackleton faced a tough challenge in mixed class 7 but they played a great match to beat class 3 Chen Jessy and class 4 Lisa Di Toro from Australia in the first round. That took them through to the last 16 where they lost 3-0 to the strong German pair of class 3 World number six Thomas Bruechle and class 4 World number two Sandra Mikolaschek from Germany.
“The atmosphere was fantastic,” said Shackleton. “My first match and I get to play with Tom as well. I felt that the crowd were so invested in Para table tennis and it was nice to feel the support - even though we’re not at home it felt pretty much like a home Games or as close as it could be. I think we put in a great effort there – we were obviously up against it a little bit with the classification difference, but I thought we put in a good performance and had some good table time and can hopefully take that into the singles.”
“I’m really happy with the experience out there,” said Matthews, “and it’s great to do it alongside your best friend on the table. We wouldn’t get that opportunity anywhere else and to do it at a Paralympic Games on the major stage is just amazing. Best of luck to Megan in the singles – I’m going to take this experience forward into the singles and hopefully win the thing.”