Bulgarians Gabriela Stoeva and Stephanie Stoeva were eliminated in the quarterfinals of the Olympic badminton tournament in Paris, BTA reported.
The three-time European champions lost 15:21, 8:21 to the leaders in the world rankings and current world champions Qingchen Chen and Yifan Jia (China). The meeting lasted 42 minutes.
The Bulgarians started nervously and allowed the Olympic vice-champions from Tokyo 2020 Chen and Jia to lead 8:1. Subsequently, the backlog of the Stoevi sisters became 3:12. Gradually they mobilized, played better and managed to reduce to 12:16, but they did not have the strength for more.
The 27-year-old Chinese women, four-time world champions in 2017, 2021, 2022 and 2023, started the second game strongly and won 4:0. Subsequently, with a new series of five points in a row, the Asian women increased their lead to 10:3, which reached 17:6, which finally decided the match.
The Stoevi sisters did record their best Olympic performance after finishing ninth at the Rio 2016 Games in Tokyo 2020. They finish fifth in Paris.