South Korea defeated Germany to claim the bronze medal in the women's table tennis team event at the Paris Olympics on Saturday. The trio of Shin Yu-bin, Jeon Ji-hee and Lee Eun-hye beat Shan Xiaona, Wan Yuan and Annett Kaufmann by 3-0 after taking one doubles and two singles matches at South Paris Arena 4 in the French capital. This was South Korea's second medal in the women's team event, which was added to the Olympics in 2008. South Korea won bronze that first year and went 16 years before picking up its second medal. Shin, having earlier won the mixed doubles bronze, grabbed two medals at her second Olympics at age 20. "I am so thankful for my two teammates. They are the best," Shin said. "They played so well today and I just had to be a cheerleader. I thought I was going to cry over every point they scored." Shin had a long tournament, in which she also played in the women's singles. She also made it to the bronze medal match there but lost to Hina Hayata of Japan. "I felt tired toward the end to day because I've played so many matches," Shin said. "But Ji-hee had my back, and I trusted her throughout our doubles match. It was a match we absolutely had to win and she came through." Jeon, Shin's 31-year-old doubles partner, earned her first medal at her third and possibly final Olympics. This was Lee's Olympic debut at 29. Jeon and Lee are both Chinese natives who switched allegiance to South Korea in 2011. "I am so happy now. It was great to be competing with these two," Jeon said. "Because Yu-bin is ranked so high in the world (No. 8 before Paris), it gave our team a high seed for this event. Without that, we wouldn't even be here." Lee said she was honored to have shared the Olympic experience with Shin and Jeon. "Watching them win their doubles match gave me confidence ahead of my own match," Lee said. "It's been a difficult road to this point, but I am grateful that I was able to finish on such a happy note." Shin and Jeon won the opening doubles over Wan and Shan 3-2 (11-6, 11-8, 8-11, 10-1 2, 11-8). The South Koreans held match point at 10-9 in the fourth game before losing 12-10, allowing the Germans to force a deciding fifth game. And Shin and Jeon were down 7-4 in the final game before rallying with four straight points and then closing out the set and the match at 11-8. Lee stepped up next and beat Kaufmann 3-0 (11-8, 11-9, 11-2) in the singles. Lee rallied from a 7-5 deficit to win the second game and had a much easier time in the third game to give South Korea a 2-0 lead in the match score. Jeon then made quick work of Shan, beating her 3-0 (11-6, 11-6, 11-6) without much of a pushback from her opponent. Source: Yonhap News Agency