World Paddle Tennis Championships Day 3 Highlights

It was an action packed day as the quarter final bracketing was decided in both the men’s and women’s open and the team match play events completed their round robin stages.

A Mexican player drives the ball across the line while playing mid-court defence in the Mexico-Canada men’s match play event. Mexico won the match 3-0. Neil Campbell/The Epoch Times

CALGARY—It was an action packed day as the quarter final bracketing was decided in both the men’s and women’s open and the team match play events completed their round robin stages.

For Team Canada, it was a bit of a disappointing day as Gerry Martinez and Craig Hiddleston were defeated 6-2, 6-0 in their Final 16 match against Gustav Briner and Damien Diez, one of Argentina’s toughest teams.

“It didn’t go as well as we had hoped. I think we had very good rallies and very good points. Unfortunately they were just too steady for us and they had just a little bit more firepower at the end to finish off the points,” said Martinez after the match.

“They play really well. They play more matches [than we do]. So it just comes down to a little bit here and a little bit there.”

On the American side, John Chun and Leo Contini also lost their match to Argentina’s top line of Rodrigo Ovide and Fernando Cavalleri by a score of 6-0, 6-0.

Chun and Contini quickly forgot about their defeat however as later Tuesday night Team USA faced off against Portugal in men’s match play. USA won a very intense and drama-filled match 2-1, advancing to group 2 of the match play finals where they will play for places 5-8. Team USA will play Mexico on Wednesday.

“From here on out, there’s definitely only tough matches. There will not be any easy matches. We look forward to playing some good paddle,” said Mike May of Team USA.

The Canadian men played their final match of the round robin against Mexico and were defeated 3-0. They will now play in group 3 of the match play finals and vie for places 9-11.