A severe disappointment for Matti Mattsson – he said in an interview with Yle

Porilainen was polite and talkative in the Yle interview, although he was clearly seething inside.

“In swimming, the top eight get to the final and I was ninth. It’s the worst ranking in competitive sports, along with fourth place. The irritation is endless,” Mattsson said in an interview with Yle.

Mattsson swam clearly harder in the evening than in the heats. Porilainen’s time in the 200 meter breaststroke semifinals was 2:10,12. The last person to reach the final finished with a time of 2:10.07. In the preliminary heats, Mattsson’s time was 2:11,10.

“There was more of a do-it-yourself mood here than in the preliminaries. There have been disappointments and successes in my career and really everything in between. Yes, here you can think about things for a while,” Mattsson uploaded.

I was swimming the beginning went perfectly from Mattsson. He was in the top position halfway through the race and also in second when starting the last 50 meters. The last bit was clearly the most difficult and it cost him the place in the final.

“At the end, I started to freeze a little. The swimming still slowly started to get better and there is what I have trained for, but at the end I froze.”

Now Mattsson has to think about what to do next and whether his career will continue or not.

“I still enjoy competing, but before the Games I said that no lukewarm performance is enough. It still wasn’t boiling hot, but compared to the morning it was certainly much better. Time could have been taken away, but this is top sport,” Mattsson said.