Bronze medalists from Cluj 2021 Team Portugal will be participating in the STUPA 2023 European Table Tennis Championships to be held in Malmö Sweden from September 10th to 17th 2023. The team consists of YU Fu SHAO Jieni Ines MATOS and Matilde PINTO. The team is in full preparation mode for the upcoming challenges.
“Currently Matilde PINTO and I are training at the Mirandela center and we will not be participating in any competitions before Malmö. YU and SHAO are training in China and before the European Championships they will compete in the WTT tournament in Almaty ” clarified Ines MATOS.
Did you have or are you planning to have some preparation together?
“We still do not have information but it’s normal to come together some time before the big matches in our High-Performance Center to prepare ourselves in the best way for the Championships.”
How is your current shape?
“I am training to the best of my ability to help my team achieve a good result. I won’t say that I am in my best shape because I was on vacation but I am training extensively to be in top form hoping that when I arrive to play in the Championships the training will reflect in the results.”
In the first stage Portugal is placed in Group D with Serbia and Bulgaria.
“It’s always a challenging test and usually doesn’t allow for failures or mistakes. So from the first group game to the last we will have to perform at our best to ensure that we can advance to the next stage.”
MATOS put the adversaries on “scanner”.
“Regarding Serbia if I remember correctly we played against them in the Mediterranean Games and we won 3-1. However the match system is different from the European Championships and YU wasn’t there. Of course we know it’s a strong team with good players and we must give our best to win. About Bulgaria to be honest I don’t know much about the senior players but I know that if someone plays who is close to my age and has played in the European Youth Championships the girls play well. So I believe we have to approach all the matches with the same mindset because they are all important. Giving our best is the most crucial thing and sticking together as a team.”
In Cluj the team won bronze. What is the goal now?
“We set our goals as a result of our daily work. We enter competitions to be at our best for the sake of our country. If we can match last year’s result that’s good but if we can do better it would be excellent.”
The place at the Olympic Games in Paris is also at stake in Malmo. How do you look at that?
“The Olympic Games are always the ultimate aspiration for all table tennis athletes. However once again we must focus on viewing the Olympic Games as a consequence of a series of good results that we have to achieve throughout the year. So we will only think about the Olympic Games when we deserve to participate in them ” stated Ines MATOS.
