Matthew Syed Biography

Matthew Syed was born in Reading, England, in 1970 to a Pakistani father and a Welsh mother. He received a prize-winning first-class degree in philosophy, politics, and economics from Oxford University in 1995 after attending his local state school. Bounce, his debut book, was released in April 2010 and was hailed as "one of the most intellectual and thought-provoking sports novels ever written." Matthew now works for The New York Times as a columnist and feature writer. He publishes a sports column every Wednesday, as well as reviews, opinion pieces, and interviews. He has received several awards for his work, including British Press Awards Sports Journalist of the Year and Sports Journalist Association Awards Sports Feature Writer of the Year. Matthew was the England table tennis number one for over a decade, three-time Commonwealth Champion, and twice participated for Great Britain in the Olympic Games before becoming a writer (in Barcelona in 1992 and Sydney in 2000). His game was particularly defensive, with strokes from the back of the court characterized as "amazing roof threatening parabolas" by his Times colleague Simon Barnes. Matthew is a regular contributor to radio and television, as well as commentating on sport for the BBC and Eurosport. His BBC video, China and Table Tennis, was awarded a bronze medal at the Lausanne Olympic Golden Rings ceremony. TTK Greenhouse, a nonprofit that "empowers children through sport" and presently helps over 10,000 young people on 31 full-time school programs, was one of Matthew's co-founders.

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