Improvements have 'showed' this year - Shilton

Billy Shilton is the world champion in the para-table tennis class 14 doubles and a Toyko Games bronze medallist

Para-table tennis player Billy Shilton said work to improve his game has "showed" this season, as he heads to the Paralympics hoping to win another medal.

Shilton won bronze in Tokyo in the men’s class 8 team event three years ago after being selected for his first Games as a wildcard.

Yet the 25-year-old qualified for the Paris Games this spring with two gold-medal victories and another six medals this season, and is also the current world champion in the class 14 doubles.

"Every day I'm trying to do everything I can to improve and I think it's definitely showed this season," Shilton told BBC Radio Gloucestershire.

"The last couple of years were tough for me, I wasn't finding the level that I was training in matches and I found that quite difficult, but I stuck to the game plan and everything's started to come into motion now."

Shilton from Stonehouse, Gloucestershire, reached the quarter-finals of the singles events in Tokyo on his last Paralympics outing and has also won multiple European medals during his career.

This year he has taken singles gold at the Costa Brava Spanish Open and gold in the men's class 14 doubles at the Czech Open.

He also collected two silvers in the US Open and four more bronze medals before his Paralympics campaign begins on 29 August.

The team event in which he won bronze in Tokyo has been replaced with the doubles classification in Paris, an event where Shilton won the world title alongside Paul Karabardak in November 2022.

The tournament was the duo's second together and Shilton believes things have only got better since. They are seeded fifth in Paris.

"We've played two, three years together as a pair and we're going from strength to strength, every tournament we're improving," Shilton said.

"I've been working hard the last three years after Tokyo. I sat down with my coaches and we laid out the position I needed to be in a few months before Paris and I think that's paid off."

Shilton has Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease (CMT), a group of inherited conditions that damage nerves outside the brain and spine, and found his start in the sport at a local club.

His dad and two brothers now all play as well.

"I wasn't the hugest fan of table tennis at the time, I was loving football when I was a young age," Shilton said.

"But my disability started to deteriorate and I needed to find something else. Since then I've absolutely loved it."