China's three fencers in the men's epee individual, including Athens silver medalist Wang Lei, failed in the preliminaries at the Olympic Games here on Sunday.

Wang lost to Bas Verwijlen of the Netherlands 15-10 in the round of 32 and teammate Li Guojie was defeated by South Korea's Jung Jin Sun 15-6.

The only Chinese who entered the top 16 was Yin Lianchi, but he lost to Polish Radoslaw Zawrotniak 15-13 in the round of 16.

"After the first round I was too relaxed. I tried to adjust but my mindset was still in the first round," Yin said.

"I'm certainly not satisfied. I thought we had an opportunity to win," he said.

On teammate Wang's performance, he said "Wang trained very hard and I thought he had the ability to go to the next round, but he was so nervous that he didn't do the best."??

(Xinhua News Agency August 10, 2008)