PARIS: Danish table-tennis player Anders Lind, just making the Paris Olympics is a triumph over adversity: after breaking two vertebrae in a serious car crash, he feared he would never walk again.
Now the 25-year-old is into an improbable Olympic last 16 and dreaming of a medal that would represent an extraordinary battle against the odds.
When doctors x-rayed his spine after the crash in 2021, "they said maybe I'll never walk normally again," an emotional Lind told AFP after his win.
"They said maybe I'll have some nerve damage, and that with the bones that broke, there was a 70-80 percent probability that I would be paralysed," he added.
Even if he could walk again, none of the doctors he saw said he would be able to resume top-level sport – news he said sent him spiralling into depression.
"I cried for a week straight. Table tennis was my life... I don't want to work in an office, I have too much energy, I need to be active," he said.
But with the help of a corset and zimmer frame, Lind began the long road to recovery that has taken him to performing in front of a packed Olympic crowd in Paris.
First walking 20 metres, then 40, then 50, he said he felt like an old man staggering along with his walking support.
Progress was faster than doctors could have dreamed of, however, and three months later, he again picked up his beloved bat.
"Then I knew, OK, I'm going to be back. I don't know how good I'm going to be, but I'll be back," he said.
Despite having a metal rod inserted into his back, Lind said he suffers no major physical ill-effects from the accident, although he cannot bend as well as he used to.
"I think my career as a limbo dancer is over," he quipped.
Mentally, the near-death experience has given him a sense of perspective.
"If I have a bad match, I can look back and say, 'It's not as bad as it was then'," he said.
His setback has also given him a fierce determination that pulled him through in his last-32 match against Poland's Milosz Redzimski.
Leading 3-2, Lind looked to have the match sewn up, but the Pole fought back to force a deciding set.
The seventh set also ebbed and flowed with some outstanding rallies firing up the packed and raucous crowd.
At three points all in the decider, Lind pulled away to take a four-point advantage but Redzimski again scrapped back after a series of errors from Lind's bat.
A missed backhand drive from the Pole and a forehand into the net gave Lind four match points at 10-6 and he converted after a brilliant rally, slumping to the floor with emotion before hailing the cheering crowd.
"It means so much. I can't describe it. Emotions are coming into my mind in a way I can't explain. I'm so happy, I'm so proud," Lind told AFP.
He said in previous matches, he had been guilty of losing focus in a tight situation and letting the match slip away.
"But today I persevered, and I stood my ground, and I ended up winning, which I am extremely proud of."
A medal after the agonies he has suffered would be sensational, but the shock defeat of world number one Wang Chuqin has blown the draw wide open, he said.
"With the top seed going out, I'm dreaming for a medal. It's still a long shot, and it's very unlikely, but there is a chance, and if the chance comes, I'm going to take it," Lind said.--AFP