Women's handball: Korea keep their hands on title

History repeated itself at Al-Gharrafa Indoor Hall as Korea shook off a poor start to beat Kazakhstan 29-22 to claim the women's handball gold medal. In 2002, Korea beat the Kazakhs to clinch the title and they have now won all five handball tournaments since the event was included in the Asian Games in Beijing in 1990.

The result could have been very different, however, as Kazakhstan started the game brightly - going into a three goal lead after just two minutes. Korea finally got on the scoresheet, but couldn't get close to the Kazakh women, who increased their lead further to 5-1.

Even when Korea tried to claw their way back into the game, Kazakhstan scored five consecutive goals to lead 12-8, with captain Yana Vassilyeva finishing well under pressure and scoring four goals from four first half attempts.

Suddenly, Korea appeared to realise they were playing for the gold medal and turned on the style, showing why they have never lost a handball match in Asian Games history. With Moon Pil Hee and Woo Sun Hee at the centre of their best plays, Korea turned the game on its head to level the scores at the break 14-14.

With just 30 minutes remaining and the top prize up for grabs, Kazakhstan froze at the beginning of the second half and displayed little of the power they showed in the first half. The experienced Koreans took full advantage and scored five unanswered goals.

With the game slipping away, Kazakhstan put up a brave fight - reducing the deficit to four goals with ten minutes to play. But Korea were not about to let their lead, or their title, slip and three late goals, including two from Moon, secured gold once again.

After the match, Kazakh coach Lev Yaniyev sat alone on the bench for a full 20 minutes, probably wondering what he has to do to stop Korea's remarkable run.

Despite their disappointment Kazakhstan's Vassilyeva was still delighted with her team's overall performance, "It is great. Originally we thought we could win bronze. I guess we just really wanted it, especially the younger players. Everything we did, we did to the best of our ability.

"I don't really know how we could do it [stop Korea's dominance]. I think we'll just have to raise our level of competition and become stronger."

Meanwhile, Korea coach Kang Tae Koo paid tribute to his team, "In the first half we focused on wearing out Kazakhstan's energy. In the second half we had more chances and were much stronger with our fast breaks.

"We have a number of players who play overseas like Huh Young Sook and Huh Soon Young, who have joined the team late and experienced difficulties in integrating with the rest of the team.

"But then we have young players like Kang Ji Hey, who has little experience, but she performed very well tonight. I don't think we have had enough training and the team was not quite tuned in for the tournament. But the Korean ladies are wonderful, as they have a great fighting spirit. I'm happy with their overall performance."

15th Asian Games, Doha 2006