Quarter final defeat for McVeigh against World Number 3

Badminton Ulster continued their preparation towards European, World and Paralympic success with the newly created support from both Sporting Winners (Sport Northern Ireland) and the Irish Sports Council (Athlete Carding) contributing provincially and nationally to athletes with Paralympic potential.

Niall McVeigh, Andrew Moorcroft and Chris Stewart travelled to Thailand to compete in the World ranking event in Bangkok.

Niall and Andrew were both competing in SS6 Mens Singles and Mens Doubles in a newly supported Mens Doubles partnership and came very close to beating a leading World pair coming just short 22-20 in the deciding set against Didin Taresoh(Malaysia)/Jesus Silva(Peru).

In Men’s Singles Niall McVeigh topped his group with 3 wins against Denmark, Indonesia and India. Andrew Moorcroft made a good start with a strong win against India, a progressive performance against bronze medallist M K Chu and a tough match against Netherlands number 1 J S Lie, with Andrew narrowly failing to progress from the singles group stage. In the last 16 Niall would face Netherlands Number 1 and in a close match won a competitive match 21-16, 21-16.

This would lead on to a match against World number 3 and Gold medallist C Y Wong. Despite a competitive first set McVeigh could not sustain the required level of intensity with the Hong Kong number 1 running away with the second set. Some great learning for both players as they look ahead!

Meanwhile Chris Stewart competed in WH 2 class Mens singles with intense matches against some of the World’s best players from Thailand, Japan and India developing his experience with some personal best displays.This was followed up with Mens Doubles, partnering Girish Sharma from India with more strong performances against world class pairs from Japan, Korea and Europe.

Much learning and development took place pre, during and post event. Well done to all players/staff for the commitment shown. The players were supported during the event by Les Dewart Para Performance Coach (Ulster Badminton) and Kevin McGuigan Performance Analyst (Sport Northern Ireland Sports Institute).

 For a list of full results http://bwf.tournamentsoftware.com/sport/tournament.aspx?id=7F92D325-FDA6-4122-A457-C0034B9EE12E