Canadian women's table tennis squad claims silver at Pan Am Championships, advances to 2022 worlds
Men's team finishes 5th to qualify for 2022 world team championships
Canada's women's table tennis team of Mo Zhang, Ivy Liao, May Tong and Gina (Ching Nam) Fu captured silver at the 2021 Pan Am Championships in Lima, Peru this weekend.
Despite a 3-1 opening loss to the U.S., the Canadians were able to bounce back and take three consecutive victories en route to a finals berth.
Although they suffered a difficult 3-1 loss to Brazil in the final, the result meant the team punched its ticket to the 2022 world team championships in Chengdu, China.
"The team competition this time was nerve-wracking but exciting, as all of us wanted to try our best and knew that spots at the 2022 World Championships were on the line," said Liao, who also advanced to the quarter-finals in women's singles earlier in the competition.
On the men's side, Canada's Matteo Martin, Edward Ly, Eugene Wang, and Hongtao Chen finished fifth, which was enough secure qualification to the 2022 world team championships as well.
Next up for Canada will be the 2021 International Table Tennis Federation world table tennis championships in Houston, Texas, that will run from Nov. 23-29.
Zhang, a native of Vancouver, is set to compete in the women's singles event, as well as the women's doubles with Joyce Xu of Toronto, and in the mixed doubles competition pairing up with Wang, also of Toronto.
Toronto's Jeremy Hazin will compete in the men's singles event, as well as teaming up with Xu to compete in the mixed doubles competition.
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