Tokyo Paralympics: Silver for India as Bhavinaben Patel goes down fighting in table tennis final
Follow UsStory highlights
Bhavina's impressive run at the Games ended with a 7-11 5-11 6-11 loss to Zhou, a two-time gold medallist, in the women's singles summit clash which lasted 19 minutes.
The first medal for India at the ongoing Tokyo Paralympics 2020 as star player Bhavinaben Patel won the historic silver in women's table tennis (Class 4) on Sunday (August 29). She went down 0-3 to world number one Chinese paddler Ying Zhou.
The 34-year-old Patel's impressive run in her maiden Paralympic Games ended with a 7-11 5-11 6-11 loss to Zhou, a two-time gold medallist, in the women's singles summit clash which lasted 19 minutes.
Bhavina became only the second Indian female athlete to win a medal in the Paralympics after Deepa Malik, who bagged a silver in shot put F43 in 2016.
IN PICS | India at Paralympics: From Murlikant Petkar to Deepa Malik — meet the past medallists
🇮🇳's @Bhavina59068010 wins 1st 🥈 in #ParaTableTennis for India!!!!
— SAI Media (@Media_SAI) August 29, 2021
Our champ has made us all proud. She goes down 0-3 to #CHN Ying Zhou in the class 4 final and gets🥈 for 🇮🇳
We are super proud!#Praise4Para#Cheer4India #Paralympics pic.twitter.com/b0kSxLiVq9
Patel had suffered a loss to Zhou in her first group stage match earlier in the week.
Up against an opponent, who has five Paralympic medals to her name including gold medals in singles at Beijing and London, Patel seemed to struggle as she couldn't execute her strategy.
Patel, who was diagnosed with polio when she was 12 months old, had defeated world no 3 Miao Zhang of China 7-11 11-7 11-4 9-11 11-8 in the semifinal showdown on Saturday.
In the quarterfinal on Friday, Patel had defeated 2016 Rio Paralympics gold medallist and world number two Borislava Peric Rankovic of Serbia to assure a medal and script history.