Japan shock China 2-1 in Asia Cup Women's Hockey semi-finals

By Staff
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Google Oneindia News

Hong Kong, Sept 8 (UNI) Japan rallied from behind to pull off a sensational 2-1 victory over favourites China to set up a title clash with Korea in the sixth Asia Cup Women's Hockey Championship here today.

In the other semi-final, Korea outplayed defending champions India 5-2.

All the three goals of the semi-final match between the two highest-ranked teams came in the first half with Tomomi Komori and Toshie Tsukui scoring for the winners while Chen Zhao Xia found the target for China.

Japan surprisingly made early onslaughts on the Chinese goal through hardworking forward Sachimi Iwao whose shot on goal was saved by rival goalkeeper Zhang Yi Meng.

China, the Asian Games champions, slowly found more cohesion in their game and went ahead in the 20th minute via a penalty corner converted by Chen Zhao Xia.

But, from then on the game swung Japan's way as the underdogs tightened their defence and began relying on counter attack. And that paid dividends just two minutes later when Iwao again broke down the left and found Tomomo Komori unmarked in the China circle to beat goakeeper Zhang and level the score.

Japan kept up the pressure and in the 24th minute forced another penalty corner that Toshie Tsukui converted to give them a 2-1 lead at the interval.

Early in the second half, China's Tang Chun Ling came very close to restoring parity with a full blooded drive that was superbly saved by the Japanese keeper Ikuko Okamara.

But that was the last real threat to Japan's lead and with mistakes beginning to creep into China's game, the Japanese defended superbly in the second half to survive two late China penalty corners shortly before the final whistle and hang on to their lead to fashion the upset of the tournament.

''We concentrated on defence in the match and blocked China midfield to break up their attacks,'' an elated Japanese coach Yoo Sueng said later.

''Then we relied on counter attack to score which really worked for us,'' said the 37-year-old Korean born coach who took charge of the Japanese national side in June last year after living in Japan for 12 years.

UNI

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