South Korea retain title at Asian Men's Volleyball Championship

Tianjin, China, September 12, 2003 - South Korea fought back from 2-1 down to beat China 3-2 and retain their title as Asian Men's Volleyball Champions here on Friday.

The 2002 title holders outlasted China 27-25, 22-25, 21-25, 25-21 and 15-8 to finish first in the four-team round-robin final round with three wins against no defeats and in the process broke the hosts' five-match winning streak at the tournament. China received the silver medal after finishing second with two wins and a loss in the final round but both teams clinched the two berths for Asia in the World Cup in Japan in November. "Generally speaking, we played to our normal standard today," said Chinese head coach Di An'he after the match that lasted for one hour and 49 minutes. "But we had problems with our serving. We made too many mistakes in serving." Despite the final score in the tiebreaker China had their chance when they stayed within 5-4 in the opening stages. But they suddenly lost their steam as South Korea pulled away with a 6-1 burst to make it 10-6. South Korea continued to enlarge the lead and clinched their fourth Asian Championship title. Earlier on Friday, Iran beat Australia for the third place. Australia settled for fourth ahead of India. The top five finishers from the tournament will participate in the Athens Olympics qualifying tournament.