GB makes good start in Team event at Slovakia Open

The GB team made a good start to the team event at the Slovakia Open today with three wins in the first round of group matches.

Will Bayley and Paul Karabardak bounced back from their disappointment at losing in the quarter finals of the singles earlier today to win their first match in the class 7 team event 3-0 against Japan. Bayley began with a 3-0 win over Susumu Miyawaki before Karabardak showed great resolve to win his tie against Masachika Inoue 3-2 after Inoue had come back from 0-2 to level the tie at 2-2. Bayley and Karabardak then took the doubles 3-1.

In the men’s class 1 team event European champions Rob Davies and Paul Davies also had the perfect start with a 3-0 win against Brazil, although Paul Davies had to recover from losing the first set against the Brazilian number one Aloisio Lima before winning the first singles tie 3-1. Rob Davies beat Bruno De Paulo 3-0 and the Welsh pair then won the doubles 3-0.

GB Pathway Squad member Thomas Matthews, playing with the Slovakian Martin Barbierik, came back from 0-2 down in the second singles tie against the Russian Dmitry Lavrov to hold match points but could not convert them and lost 12-10 in the fifth. He then combined with Barbierik to win the doubles 3-1 before losing 3-0 to the experienced Fernando Eberhardt from Argentina, who had earlier defeated Barbierik in the first singles tie, to give a win for Argentina/Russia over GB/Slovakia 3-1.

In men’s class 6 David Wetherill won his first singles against Alexander Nagy 3-0 to give the GB/Swiss combination a 1-0 lead against the Ukraine. Valentin Kneuss then defeated Gabriel Csemy 3-2 and combined with Wetherill in the doubles to defeat the Ukrainian pair 3-2 and win the match 3-0.

Ashley Facey Thompson and Brazilian partner Erik Higa lost their first match 3-0 to the Ukraine.

Detailed results can be found at http://www.ipttc.org/upload/results/files/