Golfer Mithun finishes 14th

Dinesh WEERAWANSA reporting from China

GUANGZHOU, Nov. 20. - Mithun Perera, overall captain of the Sri Lanka contingent, finished 14th in the 16th Asian Games tennis championships concluded at the Dragon Lake Golf Club today.

Perera, who was placed second after the first day’s tee off, lost his early grip and finally settled way behind at 14 out of 76 competitors at the individual gold championship of the Games. The 24-year-old Lankan lad had an unimpressive score of 73 in the fourth and final round today to finish with a total score of 294.

His team mates - Tissa Chandradasa (42nd - 311), Vijitha Bandara (44th - 313) and Thangaraja Nadaraja (45th - 314) painted even a worse picture. That compelled Sri Lanka to give up its medal hopes in the team championship, after being placed third at the end of the first of the four rounds. Sri Lanka team finished 12th with a total of 909, way behind South Korea’s feat of 842 to win the gold.

South Korean Meen Whee Kim maintained his fine form with a final round of 69 to finish with 273 and took the gold medal. Miguel Luis Tabuena of the Philippines had a score of only 72 in the final round but his early form was good enough to assure him the silver with a total of 282. Finishing closely behind the Filipino for the bronze medal was Chien Yao Hung of Taiwan (283).

Woman golfers from Seoul fared even better, winning both the team and individual events. South Korea bagged the gold medal in team event while Hyun Soo Kim won the gold medal in the individual event.

Leena Sandamali and Niroshna Lakmali had the shock of their lives when they came to the beach volleyball centre this morning to witness Sri Lanka’s men’s team in action. It was only then that the Lankan women’s duo came to know that they are down to play in the pre-quarter finals. The team management on the previous night had informed Leena and Nirosha that they are not in the last 16. Finally the two lasses who came in as spectators, had to borrow two ‘shorts’ from their men’s team and two general Guangzhou ‘T’s to be in a makeshift outfit to honour their pre-quarter final fixture. Having come to the game with virtually no preparation, Leena and Nirosha suffered the obvious fate - a 0-2 defeat at the hands of China’s Huangying and Yueyuan 3-21, 10-21.

Meanwhile, North Korean Song Guk Sung outpointed Sri Lanka’s Chaminda Tennekoon 15:2 in their men’s 46-49kg boxing bout worked off this afternoon.

Soccer finals on Tuesday

The semi-finalists of the Asian Games men’s soccer tournament were found after last night’s quarter finals. The most exciting of them all was the game between UAE and North Korea which the former won 9-8 in a penalty shootout after the scores were tied nil-all after extra time.

But South Korea survived anxious moments to make it to the last four, beating Uzbekistan 3-1 in extra time after scores were tied one-all at the long whistle. In the other two quarter finals, Japan edged out Thailand 1-0 while Iran too had an identical victory over Oman.

In Tuesday’s semi finals, Iran will take on Japan at Yuexiu Stadium while South Korea meets UAE at Tianhe Stadium. The final and the third place play-off matches are scheduled for Thursday.