[Asian Games] Women's Handball Suffers Heavy Defeat to Japan... Fails to Secure Third Consecutive Title

The South Korean women's handball team lost to Japan, failing to achieve a three consecutive Asian Games championship.

[Image source=Yonhap News]

Coached by Henrik Signell (Sweden), South Korea lost 19-29 to Japan in the women's handball final of the 2022 Hangzhou Asian Games held on the 5th at the Zhejiang Gongshang University Gymnasium in Hangzhou, Zhejiang Province, China. South Korea, aiming for a three-peat following the 2014 Incheon and 2018 Jakarta-Palembang Games, finished with a silver medal this time.

Since women's handball became an official Asian Games event at the 1990 Beijing Games, South Korea has failed to win only twice in nine tournaments: in the 2010 Guangzhou and this current tournament. South Korea lost to Japan in the semifinals of the 2010 Guangzhou Games, where China took the gold medal.

This is the first time in 11 years that South Korea's women's handball team has lost to Japan since the 2012 Korea-Japan regular match. However, since South Korea sent a junior team to the 2012 Korea-Japan regular match, this loss can be considered the first defeat between the actual senior national teams since the 2010 Guangzhou Asian Games semifinals, 13 years ago.

Trailing 8-14 by 6 goals at halftime, South Korea caught up to 10-15 early in the second half, looking for a chance to overturn the game, but then conceded consecutive goals to Chikako Kasai, Saki Hatori, and Naoko Sahara, widening the gap to 8 points. Japan's fast breaks proved effective, while South Korean players' good opportunities were repeatedly blocked by Japanese goalkeeper Atsuko Baba's saves.

South Korea overturned a 6-goal deficit in the first half to win the final against Japan at the Asian Championships held in Seoul last November, and also came back from a 0-5 early deficit in the final of the 2024 Paris Olympics Asian qualifiers held in Japan this August. However, this time they could not reverse the poor start.

Among team ball sports, where basketball and volleyball showed disappointing performances in this tournament, women's handball was considered a strong gold medal contender. However, the unexpected loss to Japan means the poor performance of team ball sports at the Hangzhou Asian Games continues.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.