Stephen Miller medal media coverage

As you'd expect, Paralympian author Stephen Miller is all over the national media today following his fantastic silver medal win at the Beijing Paralympics. The Sun (Miller puts Toon woes behind him) reports that, "At least there is one member of the Toon Army who can be proud of his club today. Stephen Miller put the troubles at his beloved Newcastle behind him to snatch silver at the Paralympics in the club-throw... Miller, 28, is an ardent Toon fan and got Kevin Keegan to write the foreword of his autobiography."

"The Gateshead Harrier, who struck gold at Atlanta, Sydney and Athens, looked like missing out on the medals in Beijing's Bird's Nest stadium. But he finished second after throwing a personal best of 34.37metres in his final round of the men's F32/51 event."

BBC Sport (Miller's Paralympic gold run ends) says, "Miller set a new personal best with 34.37m, but had to settle for silver."

The Times gets the distance of Stephen's medal-winning throw wrong, but says, "There was a thin silver lining for Stephen Miller, who has dominated the men's club for a decade, winning in the previous three Paralympic Games... Miller, who was born with cerebral palsy, revolutionised the discipline by introducing the over-the-shoulder throw as opposed to the front-on technique. But the rest have caught up and the 28-year-old was beaten by Mourad Idoudi, of Tunisia, who beat Miller's world record with 35.77 metres."

The Guardian (After the gold rush Miller must settle for silver solace) quotes Stephen as saying, "Silver is better than fourth, but obviously I wanted to win. Overall I'm pleased with my performance. The athlete from Tunisia threw a massive PB, but that's sport. I expected to be pushed to the limit but I fully expected 34 metres to win."

The Newcastle Evening Chronicle (Paralympic star Stephen lands silver medal) says, "Miller, the champion in Atlanta, Sydney and Athens, is an ardent Newcastle football fan - the foreword of his autobiography was written by Toon legend Kevin Keegan - and his first Paralympics defeat coincided with growing uncertainty at St James's Park."

The Northern Echo quotes Stephen as saying, "I am determined to come back from this and if I could get a medal, and gold, in London it would be a dream come true. I'll be training harder and be more prepared than ever to get that. To compete in front of a packed stadium like here is awesome and hopefully we can get some crowds like that in London."

Stephen is also featured in The Mail, The Telegraph, The Scotsman, The Herald and many more newspapers.


You can watch brief highlights of Stephen winning his Silver medal for 7 days on the BBC iPlayer (Paralympic Games Today: Beijing 2008: Day 9, 38 minutes in).

You can hear Stephen interviewed by Radio Newcastle.

And you can add your message of congratulations for Stephen here.

Paul