Honor and dishonor on 6th day of the Asian Games
Honor and dishonor on 6th day of the Asian Games
HIROSHIMA, Japan (Agencies): There was honor and dishonor on the sixth day of the Asian Games yesterday, with one of China's water babies setting a world record and a Thai soccer player evicted for drug use.
About 30 athletes have been tested since the Asian Games started last Sunday and the Thai player was the first to test positive.
Thailand's Asian Games soccer captain Kadalee Sirisak was revealed yesterday as the first drug cheat of the Hiroshima Asian Games when other nations accused Chinese stars of using steroids. He tested positive after Thailand's 2-1 defeat by Hong Kong last Monday, AFP quoted Asian Football Confederation (AFC) officials as saying.
Olympic Council of Asia (OCA) sources said traces of amphetamine, or "uppers" which speed up the body, were found. An official announcement will be made today.
Kadalee had been expelled from the athletes village and was already on his way home to Thailand. His squad suffered a 5-4 loss to Uzbekistan yesterday.
China remained supremely alone at the top of the medals table with 54 golds, followed by Japan and South Korea, both with 20 golds, who are in a see-saw battle for second spot.
Japan had the second spot because it has 18 silvers to South Korea's eight.
It was China's women swimmers who again did them proud adding the icing of a world record by 17-year-old Lu Bin in the 200- meter individual medley.
Lu took the record in two minutes 11.57 seconds, lopping .08 seconds off the world mark set by team mate Lin Li at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics.
Lu's win was part of a perfect performance of gold and silver for the Chinese women, who have let only one silver slip from their grasp in five days of swimming excellence.
Chinese men let Japan lift one gold yesterday, in the 100m backstroke, but they compensated by taking two in the 200m butterfly when Xue Wei and Zhang Bin came home in a dead heat. Mitsuharu Takane of Japan took bronze.
China's medals tally as it heads for the final day of the swimming competition now stands at a staggering 21 golds, 14 silvers and eight bronzes from 25 events.
China tasted defeat yesterday in shooting when Japanese marksman Nakashige Masaru surprised world and Olympic champion Wang Yifu of China for the men's free pistol individual gold, winning with 664.1 points to 659.3.
In tennis, former Wimbledon and U.S. Open junior champion Leander Paes led India to a first ever Asiad tennis gold medal over Indonesia, then set his sights on winning Asiad singles and doubles titles next week and Olympic gold in 1996.
Twenty gold medals will be awarded today on the Asiad's busiest day so far, including the final five in swimming.
World record -- Page 10