Taiwanese boxer Chen Nien-chin (陳念琴) won bronze at the Olympic Games in Paris on Tuesday, while other Taiwanese athletes were welcomed home yesterday.
Chen lost 4-1 against China’s Yang Liu (楊柳) in the women’s 66kg category. In Olympic boxing, there is no bronze-medal match, meaning both losing semi-finalists claimed bronze medals.
Twenty-seven-year-old Chen was competing in her third Olympics, following her participation in Rio de Janeiro and Tokyo. She is also an Asian Games bronze medalist.
Photo: Tony Yao, Taipei Times
It was the second bronze for Taiwanese boxers in Paris after Wu Shih-yi (吳詩儀) on Friday last week lost 5-0 to top-seeded Yang Wenlu (楊文璐) of China in their semi-final in the women’s 60kg category.
Another Taiwanese boxer, Lin Yu-ting (林郁婷), has already clinched a bronze medal by reaching the semi-finals of the women’s 57kg category. Lin was to fight Esra Yildiz Kahraman of Turkey after press time last night.
In table tennis, Taiwan’s men’s team were unable to get past Japan in their quarter-final on Tuesday, losing 3-1 in the best-of-five contest.
Photo: AP
In the opening doubles match, veteran Chuang Chih-yuan (莊智淵) and Kao Cheng-jui (高承睿) were defeated by Japan’s Shunsuke Togami and Hiroto Shinozuka 11-7, 11-5, 11-9.
Lin Yun-ju (林昀儒) evened the score in the first singles match against Tomokazu Harimoto, winning 11-9, 9-11, 11-7, 3-11, 11-6, rallying with five consecutive points in the final game to win a tense encounter.
However, Japan clinched the contest when Kao lost to Togami and Chuang lost to Harimoto in straight games in their respective singles matches.
Photo:AP
In athletics, sprinter Yang Chun-han (楊俊瀚) failed to reach the semi-finals in the men’s 200m on Tuesday.
He finished third in 20.73 seconds in heat 3 of the repechage round, in which 32 runners competed in four heats.
Yang was the last of the Taiwanese track and field athlete still competing at the Paris Olympics.
In the men’s canoe singles 1,000m heats yesterday, Lai Kuan-chieh (賴冠傑) qualified for the quarter-finals with a time of 4 minutes, 1.26 seconds.
However, while he improved to a 3:58.79 in his quarter-final, he was about 2 seconds off a time that would have advanced him to the semi-finals.
Lai won gold at last year’s Asian Games.
Meanwhile, the first of Taiwan’s Olympic athletes returned home aboard an EVA Air (長榮航空) flight yesterday, including badminton gold medalists Lee Yang (李洋) and Wang Chi-lin (王齊麟).
Former world No. 1 Tai Tzu-ying (戴資穎) and the rest of the Olympic badminton players, as well as Lee Meng-yuan (李孟遠), a bronze medal winner in the men’s skeet, and other shooters were also on the flight.
Shuttler Chou Tien-chen (周天成), who finished in the top eight in the men’s singles, said that on the journey home, the team members were pleasantly surprised to hear a special message of congratulations from President William Lai (賴清德).
“We all felt honored, dignified and respected to hear words of encouragement from our president. The captain also gave a message of support for us. We were all quite delighted,” Chou said.
Lee Yang said he would retire from badminton after bringing home a second gold in the men’s doubles and would promote badminton to cultivate new talent and improve the skill level in Taiwan.
He added that he was considering a future in the national badminton association.
“Wang and I as a team had our ups and downs in the past three years,” he said. “Many people did not rate our chances in Paris... We are very happy to have given our best and to have won every match on the way to the gold medal and to make Taiwanese proud.”
Asked what his best memory of the Games was, Lee Yang said that “it was at the end, kneeling to kiss the court.”
“It was my way to kiss goodbye to the world stage. Winning the final was very emotional for me and the kissing was a spur-of-the-moment thing,” he said.
At the airport, members of the public welcomed the athletes, holding signs saying: “We support our team” and “We are proud of our pride of Taiwan.”
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