Tomas Machac and Katerina Siniakova rallied from the brink of defeat to win the mixed doubles gold medal at the Paris Olympics.
The team from the Czech Republic trailed the Chinese duo of Wang Xinyu and Zhang Zhizhen 8-6 in a dramatic match-tiebreak on Friday, but after clawing back to 8-all, they welcomed a double fault from Zhang that set up match point. The former off-court couple sealed gold when Machac's fierce service return drew a volleying error from Wang, who earlier in the set had made a number of clutch poach volleys for winners.
Both playing mixed doubles at the Olympics for the first time, Machac and Siniakova became the first Czechia team to win the mixed doubles gold with their 6-2, 5-7, 10-8 victory.
Siniakova collected her second gold medal; she previously won the women's doubles gold in Tokyo with Barbora Krejcikova.
Earlier in the day, Felix Auger-Aliassime and Gabriela Dabrowski won the mixed doubles bronze medal with a 6-3, 7-6(2) victory over the Dutch duo of Wesley Koolhof and Demi Schuurs.
The Canadian pair looked headed for a comfortable win after leading 6-3, 3-0, before Koolhof and Schuurs rallied to extend the second set to a tiebreak. But the Canadians steadied to become the second players from their nation to win an Olympic medal following the gold medal success of Sebastien Lareau and Daniel Nestor in Sydney in 2000.
