Schooling 'can't ask for more' after finishing fifth

Singapore swim star Joseph Schooling clocked 22.95 seconds to finish fifth in the men's 50m butterfly final at the Fina World Championships in Budapest, Hungary this morning (Singapore time).

Schooling, who had targeted gold medals in the 50m and 100m fly at the Worlds, clocked 23.05sec in the heats and 22.93sec in the semi-finals on Sunday.

The 22-year-old's semi-final timing was a new Asian and national record.

Sounding disappointed, Schooling said after the race this morning: "I can't ask for more, three best times in three swims.

"I am disappointed with the result, but I think it sets me up to have a good rest at the meet.

"I will go back, get over it and learn from the race. That's part of racing, that's fine."

Briton Benjamin Proud won the event in 22.75sec, while Brazil's Nicholas Santos (22.79sec) and Ukraine's Andrii Govorov (22.84sec) clinched the silver and bronze respectively.

American Caeleb Dressel was fourth with 22.89sec.

Schooling said: "Five guys under 23 seconds in the top eight, that's amazing.

"Hats off to Ben; you'd never know what is going to happen in the 50m fly, you have to do everything perfectly."

"Having two people clocking 22.7 seconds, I think that's the fastest World Championships (in this event) we have seen in a while," added the butterfly specialist, who finished seventh in the same event at the 2015 Worlds in Kazan, Russia.

The 2016 Olympic 100m fly champion was slated to compete in the 200m fly heats today, but has reportedly dropped the event.

Schooling will also compete in the 100m freestyle, as well as his pet event 100m fly in the coming days.

Meanwhile, Singapore's Quah Zheng Wen failed to make the semi-finals of the 100m backstroke, after finishing 18th overall in the heats earlier yesterday.

The 20-year-old clocked 54.68sec, more than half a second off his national record of 54.03sec.

The 16th and final spot for yesterday's semi-finals went to Russia's Kliment Kolesnikov (54.51sec). China's Xu Jiayu topped the qualifiers with his time of 52.77sec.

Quah said after his race that he had been focusing more on butterfly than the backstroke in recent times, but added that he didn't "go out hard enough, with enough speed".

Quah said: "This meet is the first one, coming out of the short-course meets (in the US), which I have shaved and tapered for, so that is always kind of hard.

"All in all, I think I put together the swim as well as I could; I felt pretty good in the water and I think it's just a matter of how much I have been swimming backstroke for the past few months."

The Anglo-Chinese School (Independent) graduate added that he got his first-race jitters out of the way with this race, and is looking forward to today's 200m butterfly heats.

Quah considers this event his best chance of making a final in this Worlds, having finished 10th overall in this event at the Rio Olympics last year.

He said: "I think it's just bad luck that for the past few meets, the 100m back has always been the first one, sort of the ice breaker.

"It's always hard for me in the 100m back but, for sure, I think the 200m fly is my focus, my best chance (of making a final).

"I am definitely going to be better tomorrow.

"I will put it (the 100m back heats) behind me and see what I can do in the 200m fly tomorrow."