The Malmo Open is always a highlight of the year for the Irish Para Development Squad and this year we had nine players travel to Sweden to compete in the competition accompanied by coaches Sam Logue and Tara Fusco. The Irish squad competed in a tournament which saw an overall entry number of 135 players from 12 countries in total.
The action began on the morning of Friday 7th of Feb with the doubles competition. Each of the Irish pairings competed well and ensured a good start was made to the event. Notable results included Aaron Mellows and Jude Sheldon who reached the Last 16 and lost out to recent Paralympic bronze medallists Bly Twomey and Fliss Pickard representing Brighton TTC. Paddy Vaughan and his Swedish partner also bowed out in the Last 16. The first medal of the weekend was picked up by Seán Geoghegan who partnered Denmark’s Nicklas Jensen to win gold in the plate event of the doubles.
The group stages of the Performance singles event were held on Friday afternoon. This event saw players placed in ‘banded’ groups based on ability level. Each of the Irish players put in some solid performances ahead of the knockout stages being played on Saturday morning. Paddy Vaughan achieved the best result of the Irish team in this event. Playing in the highest tier ” Performance Elite” event, he lost in a close encounter to eventual winner Shae Thakker of Brighton in the quarter final. Playing in the second tier, “Performance 1” event Seán Geoghegan and Aaron Mellows also both lost out in the Last 16 while Sam Brennan, Jude Sheldon and Kevin O’Callaghan also playing in “Performance 1” were eliminated in the group stage.
Five Irish players compete in the Youth (u15) and Junior (u20) boys events on Saturday afternoon. Once again, each of the lads gave very good accounts of themselves with successful results being achieved. Undoubtedly the highlight was Kevin O’Callaghan who was a gold medallist in the Youth Wheelchair event. He was joined in the medals by Sam Brennan who was a silver medallist in the Junior Plate losing 3-1 to Dan Thomson from Brighton in the final. Patrick McCormack was a losing quarter finalist in the plate while Aaron Mellows and Jude Sheldon put in some excellent performances to progress through the group stage but unfortunately were knocked out in the quarter final and Last 16 stages respectively.
The third and final event- the traditional Para classes (1-11) began with the group stages on Saturday evening and conclude with the knockouts on Sunday morning. Once again,
the Irish players dug deep and gave some excellent performances. Class 11 was the event with the largest Irish representation with four players. Despite being knocked out of the initial group, Aoife Kelly and Patrick Sweeney fought hard and were both losing quarter-finalists in the plate, with Aoife losing out to the eventual winner. Patrick McCormack and Aaron Mellows performed excellently to progress from their respective groups, Patrick just missed out on a medal with defeat in his quarter-final match but Aaron managed to go one step further by reaching the semi-finals and earning a well-deserved bronze medal, losing his match to eventual silver medallist Bobby Sjostrom of Sweden. In the combined Class 9-10 event, Sam Brennan was a losing quarter-finalist in the plate despite some hard fought battles while in Class 8 Jude Sheldon claimed a bronze medal in the plate event losing out to silver medallist Farid Nolan. Seán Geoghegan progressed to the plate final in Class 8 and beat Nolan to claim his second medal of the event.
Playing in Class 7, Paddy Vaughan progressed to the semi-finals where he came up against Krizander Magnussen of Norway, the current World #15. The pair have had some close encounters in the last 12 months and despite an excellent showing from Paddy, unfortunately it was Magnussen who came out on top this time around in a close fifth set to progress to the final. Paddy earned the Irish squad’s seventh medal with his bronze. Last but not least, having taken plenty of confidence from claiming gold in the
youth wheelchair event from the day before, Kevin O’Callaghan competed in the combined Class 1-3 event. The 14 year old Corkman had some fantastic displays on route to the final where he would meet Peter Isherwood from Canada (World #40 in Class 2) who had recently competed in Paris at the Paralympic Games. Kevin didn’t let the experience of his opponent faze him and continue his strong run of form to come out a 3-1 winner and take a second gold of the tournament.
The standard of the Malmo Open increases year on year and each of the Irish players can take positives from how they played and are motivated to take home what they’ve learned from the tournament while continuing to work hard in training. An overall total of eight medals between plate and main events is a haul to be proud of and highlight the bright future of Para table tennis in Ireland. A big thank you must go to National Para Coach Sam Logue and Tara Fusco who accompanied the team and whose advice and support to the players were invaluable throughout the tournament. Thanks also to Para Manager Eoin Kelly along with Sam for their continued support and development of the Para programme. Finally a special mention must go to the travelling parents who helped contribute to a fantastic weekend enjoyed by everyone.
The squad will look forward to returning to Malmo in 2026 and aiming to achieve even greater results!
