ATHENS, Sept. 21 (Xinhuanet) -- France celebrated gold medal in the team men's epee competition at the 12th Paralympic Games, after an exiting final against Poland.

    The last-minute winner was Cyril More of France. Poland was leading 40-36 when he took over for the decisive bout. Radoslaw Stanczuk of Poland had no chance in that final stage, he lost 9-3, bringing France to a 45-43 win.

    "I am super happy, because yesterday I won the individual medal on my own and today I did it with the team," More said after the match.

    Polish fencers had it in their hands. Leading with four hits before the last match should normally be enough to take the match home, but More seemed to be so confident in that match, that Stanczuk could only watch how he lost more and more points.

    "The French team was really strong tonight and they proved that they were better than us," added Robert Wysmierski.

    The bronze medal was not as tough as the final. China beat Hong Kong 45-32, which leaves for the first time the team from Hong Kong without a medal in a fencing event at the Athens Games.

    But what the men did not do Tuesday, the ladies did. Hong Kong won the women's foil team event. Fan Pui Shan, Chui Yee Yu and Yui Chong Chan beat Hungary 45-22 in the final match.

    It was the fourth title for Chui Yee Yu in this Paralympics. "I am so happy about this, but it's not time to celebrate right now, we still want to support our men's sabre fencers in the next two days before doing a big party," she said.

    Hong Kong is still leading the medal table with 12 medals in total (7-4-1) at the moment. "Their style of fencing is very quick", Zsuzsanna Krajnyak said moments after the individual competition. "And they train much more, than we do."

    Indeed Hong Kong's preparation training camp started three months before the Athens Games. From that moment everyone was practicing fencing almost every day.

    However, the bronze medal match was a European duel between France and Poland. The match proved to be tough enough that things cleared up just on the last minute under the so called "golden hit rule". The score stood at 44-44 when the time after the ninth bout was elapsed. Poland won first the priority in the draw, but they did not need that priority. Dagmara Witos made the decisive hit just after ten seconds in the last minute, which sealed the bronze medal for Poland. Enditem