Asian Games | China secures table tennis mixed doubles top two, Japanese star Harimoto suffers shock exit

NAGOYA, Japan, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) -- Lin Shidong and Kuai Man defeated fellow Chinese pair Wang Chuqin and Sun Yingsha 4-0 in the table tennis mixed doubles final at the Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games to win gold on Saturday.

Lin and Kuai won the first three games 11-9, 13-11 and 11-9 before recovering from a six-point deficit in the fourth to win 11-9 and complete the sweep.

"Actually, I had just finished the singles match, I was still in the rhythm of competition, so I probably didn't even need to prepare and could just go straight into the match," Lin said.

"We just fought for every point and kept battling. The match was very intense for both of us, so it wasn't easy to come away with the win," he added.

South Korea's Lim Jong-hoon and Shin Yu-bin, and India's Manush Shah and Diya Chitale, shared the bronze medals.

In the men's singles, the day's major upset went to Japan's star player Tomokazu Harimoto, ranked fourth in the world, who lost 4-3 to Iran's Noshad Alamiyan, ranked 344th, in the quarterfinal.

"If you only look at the content of the match, I think you can say it was almost a complete defeat. The only game I really played well and managed to win was probably the third," Harimoto said. "There were many reasons, but in competitive sport, the result is everything. I didn't win a medal, so I didn't win a medal. That's it."

Harimoto's 19-year-old teammate Sora Matsushima also lost in the quarterfinal, falling 4-2 to China's Lin. Japan was therefore eliminated from the men's singles competition.

In the semifinals, Wang will face Alamiyan, while Lin will take on Chinese Taipei's Lin Yun-ju.

In the women's singles, China's Sun and other leading players advanced to the semifinals. Sunday's semifinals will see Sun meet Japan's Hina Hayata, while China's Wang Manyu will encounter Japan's Miwa Harimoto.

In the women's doubles, China's Kuai Man and Wang Manyu defeated Japan's Miyu Nagasaki and Rin Mende 3-0 to reach the semifinal. Japan's Miwa Harimoto and Hina Hayata advanced with a 3-0 win over China's Fan Shuhan and Chen Yi.

In the men's doubles, China's Lin Shidong and Huang Youzheng will play against Japan's Tomokazu Harimoto and Hiroto Shinozuka on Sunday. The other semifinal will also be a China-Japan match-up, with Japan's Sora Matsushima and Shunsuke Togami taking on China's Wen Ruibo and Xiang Peng.