Congratulations to Mo Zhang and Ivy Liao for their silver medal in WD, even though they were not seeded.
Congratulations to our Men’s team for not only getting the Silver Medal, but for earning a spot at the Paris Olympic Games for Canada in the Team event by placing in the top 2 in Cuba.
In Cuba, Canada’s women were seeded 4th and the Men were seeded 5th. It was a tall order to try to finish in the top 2, but not impossible.
Unfortunately, although our women won their group, and moved into the top 8 knockout stage as a top-4 seed, they had a heart-breaking loss to Chile 3-2, and lost their chance to move into the final 4 and compete for the top 2 positions. This loss was the pivoting point for our women, missing the Olympic Team qualification.
On the other hand, although our men did not win their group and finished second to Argentina, an interesting turn of event and a good draw, allowed our men to win their match in the knockout stage and qualify for the final 4 round robin group. The USA had a bad draw and lost to Brazil, thus missing the final 4. This was a great breakthrough for our Men. But the real pivoting point was the unexpected 3-0 win for Canada against Puerto Rico in our first match in the RR-Group. This changed everything. Brazil won all its matches to finish first, and the other 3 teams in the RR tied for second place. Canada came through based on its win-loss record in the RR against the tied teams of 5-3, Puerto Rico 3-4 and Chile 4-5, with Canada clinching second place overall.
Canada’s win against Puerto Rico 3-0 was a huge surprise but proves that all is possible. However, our loss to Chile 2-3 in our last match should have been a 3-1 win (check the results).
It is ironic that Canada lost to Chile 3-2 on both women and men events. However, the outcome is very different. This loss eliminated our women, while it gave the men the necessary points to finish in the top 2. This is sport.
Overall Canada did not do very well winning only 2 medals. This is overshadowed by the final men’s results. But we must take into consideration that Canada fielded some young players: Jessie Xu (15), Fiona Nie (18), Simeon Martin (18), Edward Ly (20), and Ivy Liao (22).
I would like to thank the coaches, Wen JianRen and Maxime Surprenant for their work with the women’s team and men’s team respectively.
I also would like to thank Mo Zhang and Eugene Wang for leading our teams and using their vast experience for the benefit of our younger players.
For detailed results, click here: