Japan inflicts severe blow to mighty Chinese swimmers

Wed, 09 Dec 1998, 00:00 WIB | Source: AFP

BANGKOK (Agencies): Japan humiliated China's controversial
swimmers at the Asian Games on Tuesday as the sporting superpower
struggled to get the gold medals it has become used to.

Takahiro Mori, Masami Tanaka, Takashi Yamamoto and the men's
freestyle relay team ushered in a defiant new mood as China
failed to win any of the five swimming finals.

Taiwanese Tsai Shu-min sneaked in ahead of Qin Caini in the
women's 200-meter freestyle to add to the angry mood in the
Chinese camp.

"Today is the darkest day for Chinese swimmers," said China's
head coach Zhang Xiong.

China also faced a new day of toil in the shooting, where it
managed only one gold out of six, but extraordinary performances
in diving, weightlifting, and gymnastics gave China a slender 13-
12 lead over Japan in the gold medal rankings.

It has been a long time since Japan has seen such a night of
triumph in the Asian Games swimming.

Yamamoto won the men's 100m butterfly in a Games record of
53.34sec, Tanaka took the women's 200m breaststroke, Mori the
men's 400m individual medley and their men took the 4 x 200m
freestyle relay.

"I'm number one in Asia," shouted Yamamoto, as Japanese
celebrations got underway.

China cannot now hope to match the 25 swimming golds it won in
Hiroshima four years ago, where it feat was overshadowed by seven
drug failures, including two world champions.

China has also been counting on picking off shooting range
titles in Bangkok, but has managed only one out of the 10 decided
so far.

Trainee teacher Dina Aspandiyarova of Kazakhstan claimed a
gold in the women's air pistol final and silver in the team event
to grab the glory on the second day. China got only the team air
pistol gold.

The Games favorite marksmen have been struggling all week with
poor health and concentration.

China's Cai Yeqing who was second to Aspandiyarova highlighted
the mounting nerves of her team. "Occasionally, I even did not
think I was holding the gun properly. So I had to raise or lower
the pistol several times," she said.

There was controversy in tae kwon do when the judges ruled out
their own decision to give Indonesia's woman flyweight Juana
Wangsa Putri a win over Thailand's Usa Sinlapajarn only after the
home side lodged a protest.

Bloody nose

Juana, making her debut, had to be content with the bronze.

Indonesia lost another chance to win its first gold medal
after Satriyo Rahardani, fighting with a bloody nose, was
outdueled by Vietnam's Ho Nhat-Thong in their tae kwon do men's
flyweight final.

Combined with woman lifter Sri Indriyani's third-place finish
on Monday, Indonesia has now collected a silver and two bronzes.
The Jakarta Post quoted Reuters on Monday that Indonesia won a
silver and three bronzes.

In weightlifting, China's Yang Xia created a sensation by
setting two world records on her way to the gold medal in the
women's 53kg class.

The 21-year-old student lifted 120kg in the clean and jerk to
overtake compatriot Wang Xiufen's record of 117.5kg set at the
world championships in Finland last month. Her overall 212.5kg
surpassed Wang's world record of 210kg.

Teammate Le Maosheng then won the men's 62kg to continue
China's impressive sweep of all four golds contended so far.

World champions Liu Xuan, Bi Wenjing, Kui Yuanyuan and their
young teammates Meng Fei, Xu Jing and Ling Jie also retained the
women's team gymnastics title with 154.174 points. Japan was
second and South Korea third.

The Chinese dedicated their victory to 17-year-old teammate,
Sang Lan, who was paralyzed while practicing at the Goodwill
Games in New York in July.

The first snooker final at the Asian Games, meanwhile, was won
by Shokat Ali of Pakistan who came back from six frames to four
down to beat Malaysia's Sam Chong 7-6.