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South Korea registered a narrow 3-2 win against China in their third match of the Champions Trophy here in Moqi Hockey Training Base in Hulun Buir, China, on Wednesday.
It was a thriller match with both teams coming up with a nail-biting finish, but it was eventually goals by Hyeonhong Kim (21'), Junghoo Kim (53') and Jihun Yang (55') that ensured Korea watched away with the winning points. At the end of the day's play, India remains on top of the table and have become the only team to make the semifinal cut with three consecutive wins, while Korea is now placed second ahead of Pakistan due to goal difference and China are placed fourth. In the start of the match, however, it was China who got off on a positive note. Backed by tremendous home support, they controlled the ball well, made difficult forays into the Korean circle. They even earned as many as two PCs, and converted in the 14th minute. It was their PC specialist, Jiesheng Gao, who came up with a perfect dragflick to give his them a 1-0 lead early in the game and put pressure on Korea. Though Koreans too created three PCs in the first quarter, the Chinese defence held strong, with their goalkeeper Caiyu Wang making some desperate saves. In the following quarter, Korea opened their scoresheet with a brilliantly-struck PC by Hyeonhong Kim. The equaliser meant that China would have to work their way into building a compact and effective attack to regain the lead. The crowd, with their loud chants, buoyed them to surge ahead. They managed hard-fought circle penetrations, but couldn't convert any. In the meantime, Korea created two more chances from PCs, but the Chinese defence held sway. The third quarter ended in a stalemate with both teams trading chances in the circle. Though China won a PC in this quarter, they unfortunately could not convert it. Korea, nearly gave in their all with defending as they made some incredible saves in the goal-mouth to stop the hosts from taking the score to 2-1. There was plenty of action in the final quarter, with Korea scoring two goals. Under pressure to keep the lead, China made errors in the circle while defending, which cost them dearly. They ended up conceding PCs, and Korea scored two of the three PCs they created in this quarter. First it was Junghoo Kim who scored Korea's second goal in the 53rd minute, and two minutes later Jihun Yang struck another one in the 55th minute. To the home crowd's delight, China scored in the 60th minute to narrow down the lead to 2-3. It was Ziyang Huang who nicked this one in after Korean goalie Jaehan Kim make a great save off the shot taken by Benhai Chen. Huang had waited patiently in front of the post to pick up the deflection. With 11 seconds to go, China won a PC but couldn't manage to convert it, handing Korea a 3-2 win. Hero of the Match, Jungjun Lee of Korea, said, "We are very happy about this win. We worked very hard to beat China and hopefully still keep our chances of playing the semifinals alive." (ANI)
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