Table tennis: Defeat for veteran

Expatriate New Zealander Peter Jackson's third Olympic table tennis campaign started on the wrong note with a straight-sets loss to wily Indian Chetan Baboor on Monday.

France-based Aucklander Jackson, who has represented New Zealand since 1981, struggled to find a way through Baboor's solid defence and went down 23-25, 18-21, 21-23.

Jackson, docked a point for an illegal serve for the first time in his career by the German umpire, seemed to have the first set sewn up when he led 18-12, but he went downhill from there to lose the extended set.

He was always chasing Baboor's lead in the second set, and down 5-12 in the third, he took a time-out and clawed his way back to an 18-17 lead. Jackson then lost three points on his own serve before rallying again and smashing his way to a set-point. But Baboor capitalised on the New Zealander's errors to win the final points.

In the women's singles, Karen Li rebounded from her first match defeat to outplay Sofija Tepes Cancino, of Chile, 21-12, 21-12, 21-16. Following her debut in the red hot atmosphere of Olympic competition, Li looked more settled yesterday.

Li's earlier loss to Singaporean Jing Jun Hong means Jing is the likely qualifier from their pool of three to advance to the next round.

- NZPA