PARALYMPICS: There were mixed fortunes for a number of Irish athletes in action on day four Paralympic Games in Beijing with the Boccia team continuing to go from strength to strength.
The mixed boccia team (BC1-2) comprising yesterday's bronze medal winner Gabriel Shelly, Roberta Connolly, Pádraic Moran and Tom Leahy advanced from Pool C to the quarter-finals along with Spain.
In their opening match Ireland defeated Finland 7-3 before losing heavily (12-1) to pool winners Spain. However the Irish quartet still did enough for a place in the last eight where they will meet home favourites China tomorrow.
Eilish Byrne finished fifth in today's equestrian freestyle grade II event with a points tally of 66.110 on board her horse Youri. American Rebecca hart won on Noteassa with 65.833.
At the velodrome Michael Delaney and sighted pilot rider David Peelo finished sixth in the men's sprint qualification B&VI (1-3) to qualify for the quarter-finals where they lost to South Africa's Gavin Kilpatrick and Michael Thomson.
At the Water Cube David Malone missed out on a place in the final of the men's 100metres (S8) when he finished fifth in heat two in a time of 1:16.80.
After progressing through the archery ranking round, Sean Heary booked his place in the last eight of the men's in individual compound with a 108-104 win over Germany's Michael Arenz.
Ireland were totally outplayed and lost 7-0 to Ukraine in their group B match of the men's seven-a-side football match in front of a crowd of 6,763 at the Olympic Green Hockey Field.