The sports leader, who is serving his third and final term at FPTM, was involved in the naturalization process (completed in 2013) of Fu Yu in 2012, who was born in China 45 years ago but has been living in Portugal since 2001 and is married to a Portuguese man.
“Fu began representing Portugal in 2013, a risky bet at the time, but one that has been more than successful. If someone had made this decision earlier, perhaps today we would have different stories to tell about the women’s national teams. With Fu, it has been 11 years of privilege and an exemplary way of representing Portugal, worthy of making some who were born right in the national territory blush,” he recalls.
Fu Yu was eliminated today in the round of 32 at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, with Portugal finishing its participation in the singles event in 17th place, repeating the classification obtained at Tokyo2020.
The Portuguese player, ranked 80th in the world, was trailing 0-2 but managed to recover, impose her game, and had a 3-2 lead over her opponent. However, in the next two sets, the Polish Natalia Bajor (48th in the world) was stronger, winning 4-3.