Sri Lanka’s hopes of winning at least a bronze medal were dashed when South Korea scored a convincing 36-14 win in the third place decider of the Rugby Sevens at Palembang, Indonesia yesterday.
The South Koreans dominated the first half with tries from Chang Younghung, Kim Jeongmin and Jan Jeongmin which gave them a 19-0 lead at the breather. However the Lankans reduced the deficit after half time when Tharinda Ratwatte scored a try which he himself converted.
The South Koreans came back storming to score tries through Kim Hyunsoo (one) and Kim Jinhyok (two) to make it 36-7 before Sri Lanka’s Jason Dissanayake scored a try which was converted and the score read 36-14 at the final whistle.
Earlier Sri Lanka put up a gallant display against mighty Japan when they went down fighting 10-12. Sri Lanka got off to a flying start when Kavindu Perera scored a try in the very first minute of the match but Srinath Sooriyabandara missed the difficult conversion. The Japanese hit back through a brilliant try by H. Kosuke which levelled the scores.
The Lankans went ahead once again when skipper Sudarshana Muthuthanthri scored a superb try to make it 10-05 in favour of Sri Lanka. However Japan grabbed the lead when Katsuyuki Saki scored a brilliant try after running through virtually the entire Sri Lanka defence to score under the posts and the Japanese ran out winners by 12-10 much to the relief of their supporters.
Skipper Sudarshana Muthuthanthri said that the Sri Lanka Rugby Sevens team had high hopes of winning a Silver medal when we were leading 10-05 in the second half but we let the game slip out of our hands which resulted in us being relegated to the bronze medal decider against South Korea but we surrendered tamely to the South Koreans which dashed our medal hopes.
Lack of international exposure for our players was the reason for our defeats as both Japan and South Korea are regularly taking part in International competitions.
The Sri Lanka men’s volleyball team finished in 13th place after beating Vietnam by three sets to nil in the 13th place decider. They won the first set 25-21, the second set 25-21 and final set 25-20.
Sri Lanka ended up without winning a single medal which is the fourth time it has happened with the earlier occasions being 1982 (New Delhi) 1986 (Seoul), and 2010 (Guangshu).
China emerged champions for the 10th successive time by winning 289 medals (132 Golds, 92 Silver and 65 Bronze). Japan ended up in second position with 205 medals (75 Golds, 56 silver and bronze 74) South Korea finished in third position with 177 medals (49 Golds, 58 silver, and bronze 70) The host nation Indonesia which bagged 98 medals (31 Golds, 24 Silver and 43 bronze) was fourth.
Five new world records were set up at this year’s Asian games and one equalled – South Korea two in archery, and one each by China (Swimming), Iran (weightlifting) and Chinese Taipai (pistol shooting) who also equalled one record in the same event. In the 44 nation tournament seven countries including Sri Lanka could not win a single medal.
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