South Korea’s ‘Avengers’ claim another Asian Games fencing gold
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South Korea's "Avengers" (from left) Kim Jun-ho, Kim Jung-hwan, Gu Bon-gil, and Oh Sang-guk posing with their gold medals.
PHOTO: REUTERS
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HANGZHOU – South Korea’s Olympic champion fencers clinched a third straight gold for their nation in the Asian Games men’s team sabre on Thursday, as Chinese Taipei’s Lee Chih-kai retained his gymnastics pommel horse title.
Nicknamed “The Avengers”, Oh Sang-uk, Kim Jun-ho, Kim Jung-hwan and Gu Bon-gil silenced a raucous home crowd at the Hangzhou Dianzi University Gymnasium by comfortably beating their Chinese rivals 45-33 in the nine-bout final.
It was a huge boost for the South Koreans less than a year before the 2024 Paris Olympics, where they will defend their Tokyo Games title in the French capital.
Gu, who was part of the team who won sabre gold at the 2012 London Olympics, also featured in South Korea’s Asian Games team sabre title-winning squads at Jakarta in 2018 and Incheon in 2014.
“The teamwork was very good and the home crowd was cheering really loudly, but it wasn’t a problem for us,” said Gu, who was runner-up in the individual event to Oh.
“(Oh) promised me we would win gold in the team match. I’m grateful to him for keeping that promise and I want to thank Kim Jung-hwan and Kim Jun-ho for working hard with me. I also dedicate my individual silver medal to my wife and my gold to my baby son.”
Apart from the men’s team sabre and individual golds, the South Koreans also won the women’s epee individual, women’s sabre individual, men’s team foil and women’s team epee.
In gymnastics, Lee, who took the pommel horse silver at the Tokyo Olympics behind Britain’s Max Whitlock, pipped Japan’s Ryota Tsumura for the gold at the Huanglong Sports Centre Gymnasium with a score of 15.50.
“I was so nervous, I was really stressed before my turn,” the “prince of the pommel horse” said, adding that he very much wanted to retain his crown.
Gold medallist Taiwan’s Chih Kai Lee competing on the men’s pommel horse in the artistic gymnastics at the Hangzhou 2022 Asian Games in Hangzhou on Sept 28, 2023.
PHOTO: AFP
Elsewhere on Thursday, Chinese tennis player Zheng Qinwen, fresh off her dream run to the US Open quarter-finals, was guaranteed at least a silver medal after prevailing 6-1, 6-7 (5-7), 6-3 in a tough semi-final against the Philippines’ Alexandra Eala. She will meet compatriot Zhu Lin in the final.
The traditional Chinese martial art of wushu has been a convenient way for the hosts to rack up medals at past Asian Games – and so it has proved again in Hangzhou. Team China finished with 11 out of 15 of the competition’s golds, seven decided on a helter-skelter final day.
Iran, the most enthusiastic wushu nation outside of China, lost three out of three gold-medal deciders to the hosts on Thursday. They included an especially bitter defeat for women’s 52-kg fighter Elaheh Mansoryan Samiroumi, now runner-up at three consecutive Games.
Gold medallist Li Yueyao from China (second left) poses with (from left) silver medallist Elaheh Mansoryan Samiroumi of Iran and bronze medallists Tharisa Dea Florentina of Indonesia and Ayan Tursyn of Kazakhstan.
PHOTO: REUTERS
Five years after losing to Li Yueyao in the battle for the gold at the Jakarta Games, Samiroumi was defeated by her Chinese nemesis again and wept on the podium.
Iran still finished with two men’s golds, both after finals against non-Chinese opponents.
“We are very strong and with more practice, more pain, more hard work, we can beat anyone. Yes, even China,” said Iran’s 65-kg champion Afshin Salimi Toupghara. REUTERS, XINHUA
