Tokyo, Aug 29: Indian table tennis player Bhavinaben Patel signed off with a historic silver medal in her maiden Paralympic Games after an unfortunate loss to world number one Chinese paddler Ying Zhou in the women’s singles. She had already defeated 2016 Rio Paralympics gold medallist and world number two Borislava Peric Rankovic of Serbia in the quarterfinals to assure a medal and script history. Zhou, a two-time gold medallist and a five-time Paralympic medallist, marked her victory after a grilling women’s singles summit clash that lasted 19 minutes. Patel had suffered a loss to Zhou in her first group stage match earlier in the week as well.
The 34-year-old Patel hails from Sundhiya village in Gujarat’s Mehsana district and was diagnosed with polio when she was 12 months old.
