Thu, Aug 11, 2016 page16

• RIO OLYMPICS: Taiwan table tennis hope falls in quarters

  • Staff writer, with CNA, Rio de Janeiro
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  Fatigued and short on sleep, Taiwan’s Cheng I-ching faltered against China’s Li Xiaoxia in the women’s singles table tennis quarter-finals at the Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on Tuesday, bowing out of the tournament in four straight games.

  Cheng, the seventh seed, was beaten by the defending Olympic champion, who was seeded third in Rio, 11-5, 11-5, 11-6, 11-6 in 32 minutes.

  “I was facing a strong opponent and I just could not get it going,” said Cheng, clearly dissatisfied with her performance.

  

  Huang Yi-ting of Taiwan rows in her women’s single sculls semi-final at the Lagoa Rodrigo de Freitas in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on Tuesday.

  Photo: EPA

  The Taiwanese No. 1 trailed throughout the match and she felt she was not as prepared to play as she could have been.

  “I was too impatient, just trying to get a game off her,” said Cheng, who nonetheless went farther than any Taiwan-born player in the women’s singles at the Olympics in history.

  Chen Jing, who won silver and bronze in the event for Taiwan in 1996 and 2000 respectively, grew up in and played for China internationally before representing Taiwan.

  

  Taiwan’s Yu Ai-wen prepares to compete in the women’s 25m pistol qualifiers at the Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on Tuesday.

  Photo: Lin Cheng-kung, Taipei Times

  After learning that her fans, relatives and even Tainan Mayor Lai Ching-te were gathered at her home in the city to show their support, Cheng broke into tears, saying: “For me to play this way, I really let them down.”

  Even fully fresh, Cheng would have had a difficult time toppling Li, but the two marathon matches she played the day before most certainly did not help her chances.

  Cheng needed 57 minutes to beat Viktoria Pavlovich in seven games on Monday morning and then another 62 minutes to overcome South Korean Suh Hyo-won in seven games on Monday night to secure a quarter-final berth.

  She cramped up late in her match against Suh, and the fatigue carried over to her match on Tuesday morning, which started at 10am.

  “It was a real struggle. I was very tired and my reflexes were a bit slow,” she said.

  “I only slept four hours and my body had still not recovered from the day before,” she was quoted as saying by Chinese-language media reports. “I really think it’s too bad, because I thought I had a chance, but in the end I wasn’t able to win even one game.”

  Though Cheng was eliminated from the singles, she has another chance to compete at this Olympics in the women’s team table tennis event.

  Other Taiwanese in action on Tuesday were Yu Ai-wen, who finished qualifying in the women’s 25m pistol in 18th with 577 points. Anna Korakaki of Greece defeated Germany’s Monika Karsch in the gold medal match.

  In the men’s 69kg weightlifting, Taiwan’s Pan Chien-hung lifted 296kg for ninth place. China’s Shi Zhiyong took gold.

  In the women’s single sculls, Huang Yi-ting of Taiwan won her semi-final in a time of 8 minutes, 38.21 seconds. The final is set for Saturday.

  In windsurfing, Taiwan’s Hao Chang placed 27th in race three, did not finish in race four and was 34th in race five, while in the men’s 200m breaststroke, Lee Hsuan-yen was fifth in heat one with a time of 2 minutes, 14.84 seconds.
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