Table tennis Portugal competes for the quarter-finals of the European Team Championship

The women’s team will open the round of 16 against Croatia at 9 a.m., and the men’s team will face the Czech team at 3 p.m.

The women’s national team is the first to participate today, Thursday, in the round of 16 competitions for the European Team Championship, which will be held in the city of Malmo, Sweden, where it will face Croatia at 9 a.m., while the men’s national team will play with the Czech Republic at 3 p.m. .

In 12th place in classification In the world and in fourth place in a row in the European table, the women’s team consisting of Fu Yu (28th), Ines Matos (272nd), Matilda Pinto (324th) and Xiao Jinye (54th) faces the Croatian team consisting of – Ivana Malobabić. (91), Hana Arapovic (140), Mattia Geiger (194) and Leah Rakovac (280) who, despite being ranked 48th in the world and 15th in Europe and without any victory over Portugal, make the national coach in charge approach the duel with caution. .

“The match against Croatia will not be easy. We have to play well, be very focused throughout the match and fight for every point. “We will do our best to reach the quarter-finals,” said Shi Juan of the team that beat Slovenia 3-0 and lost by the same score to Romania.

The men’s team (eighth in the world/fourth in Europe) faces the Czech team (25th/13th place), with whom it has never lost and which beat Italy (3-2) in the group stage and lost to Sweden (1-). 3).

“We are ready to face the Czechs, and we are aware of the difficulties they will pose in front of us. They are a very balanced team, and they have three very strong and experienced players, and they posed many difficulties for the Swedish team in the group stage.”

“It will be a very difficult match, but we will do everything in our power to reach the quarter-finals of the European Championship,” national team coach Francisco Santos predicted the confrontation with the team formed by Lubomir Jancarek (91), Tomas Polanski (91). 144th place), Jiří Martinko (211th place) and Pavel Siroczyk (416th place).

In case of victory, Portugal will meet in the quarter-finals with the winner of the confrontation between Denmark and Romania, and in the women’s match between Poland and Sweden, with both of them already guaranteed to be in the World Cup, in which it will be held. February next year in Busan, South Korea.