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Tunbridge Wells’ table tennis world champion Will Bayley has won another title.
The Paralympian and his young GB team-mate, Billy Shilton, 16, won the men’s class 7 team event at the Slovenia Open after beating world champions Spain 3-1 in the final.
With GB leading the match 2-1, Bayley, the class 7 world champion, clinched gold after a five-set win against the world No.4 Jordi Morales.
Bayley had to hold his nerve to win the final set 11-7, the match 3-2 and the tie for GB.
He said: “I just thought I’ve got to fight for every single ball because he (Morales) is going to play a lot of balls on the table and I just thought I’ve got to try and get one more ball back than he does.
“It means a lot to beat the world champions and shows we’ve got a world class team."
In the singles, Bayley beat reigning European champion Mykhaylo Popov in the
semi-finals to set up a final against the world No.1 Maksym Nikolenko in a repeat of their World Championship final last September.
After dropping the first set, Bayley played brilliantly to take the next two but the Ukrainian fought back and after winning a close fourth set, he went on to take the fifth and the match 11-4.