ASIAN GOLD

JAPAN had the strongest teams before China's emergence as the dominating power in the ninth Asian Games. Japan finished third in gold medals with 52, trailing Korea with 65. The Japanese were second in total points with 181 ahead of Korea's 164.

Host country Thailand registered its best ever Asian Games performance finishing fourth with 90 points. Its 24 Gold medals topped its previous best of 13. The Thai's total included registering 26 Silver and 40 Bronze medals.

Japan's 28-year-old track star KOJI ITO was voted the game's MVP. Ito completed the golden hat-trick winning gold medals for the 100 meter and 200 meter runs. He also won a gold medal with Japan's 4x100m sprint relay team.

Ito also set an Asian Games record of 10.00 sec. for the 100m in the semifinals. "I said before the race it meant everything and it does," he said after the race. "This is the event I most wanted to win - the time was faster than I expected because of a strong head wind."

The top Asian Games medal winners:

COUNTRY		GOLD	SILVER	 BRONZE	 TOTAL

CHINA		129	  77       68 	  274

KOREA		 65	  47       52	  164

JAPAN		 52	  61       68	  181

THAILAND	 24	  26       40	   90

CHINESE TAIPEI	 19	  17       41	   77

China's won the gold medal in men's basketball. They utilized their size with three seven-foot players to defeat South Korea 112-92. After racing to a 30-15 lead in the first nine minutes of the game they took a 59-43 at halftime.

The true test for China came in the semi-finals against the Philippines. China won 82-73 dispite a strong second-half challenge by the Philippines. The size and discipline of the Chinese team wore the smaller Philippine's down. NBA center prospect WANG ZIZHI grabbed eight defensive rebounds in the first half that ended with China leading 44-32.

The Chinese dominated the game in the half by grabbing 14 defensive rebounds and blocking three shots.

The Philippine team came out firing in the second half by driving the lane to draw fouls and popping the ball outside to shoot three pointers. The plan almost worked. The Philippine team couldn't make their three-point attempts but caused a lot of confusion to the Chinese team by taking the Chinese centers out of the game.

The Philippines made 5-of-6 free throws in the first-half and 11-of-16 in the second. It helped them to draw within five points before time expired. They were unable to make their three point attempts making only 1--of-4 in the first half and 2-of-10 in the second. The quest to win their first Asian Games gold medal in 36 years failed.

SUN JUN led the World Championship China team scoring with 15 points followed by LIU YUDONG with 13.

JOHNNY ABARRIENTOS led the Philippines with 13 points.

The Philippines won the Bronze medal by defeating Kazakhstan 73-68. The game was tied at the half 36-36.

IRAN proved to be the cream of Asian men's soccer. They won the gold medal with a 2-0 victory over Kuwait. The final was witnessed by fewer than 10,000 spectators at the 60,000 seat Rajamangala Stadium dispite the game being offered FREE OF CHARGE. Tight security was put in place to prevent any violence that might occur as a result of the bombing of IRAQ by the United States. Kuwait and Iran, both Muslim nations, border Iraq.

The Iran team proved to be too big, too strong and more experienced than their young Kuwait competition. Iran's ALI KARMINI scored just seven minutes into the match when he popped up unmarked at the far right hand post. He nodded home a corner which Kuwaiti goalie KAHLID AL-FADHLI should have had. Karmini, a 21-year old rising star left wing-back, was playing in the Iranian third division a few months ago.

Iran controlled the game with its aggressive physical play and pushed the Kuwait team around. Kuwait was never in the game and seldom threatened to score.

In the 27th minute Iran's KARIN BAGHERI on German second division side Arminia Bielefeld won a ball at mid-field and charged through the Kuwait defense and round Al-Fadhli before firing home from a narrow angle to cap Iran's scoring.

There was some irony in Iran's victory. It came at a time that Iraq was being bomdbarded with bombs by the United States. It was Iran's first Asian Games gold medal since they last won it in 1990 at the Beijing Games when they were just emerging from a decade of war against Iraq.

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GOLDEN BOY: Thailand's golden boy SOMLUCK KAMSING won a gold medal in boxing by defeating Uzbekistan's TULKUNBAV TURGUNOV 8-3 in the 57-kilogram final.

Somluck known for his flamboyance and arrogance said after the fight, "I said before the tournament that the gold medal would be a foregone conclusion for me. I'm the world's best boxer in the 57-kg division."

To Thailand Somluck will always be best known as being the countries first ever AND ONLY Olympic Gold Medal winner. He did so at the Atlanta Games. "My next goal is to win another gold at the Sydney Olympics," he added.

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SAY WHAT???: A Thai restaurateur feels his menu is the answer to success of some Asian athletes, not hard training or the latest sports technology. REENG REKLAI, 64, a former mercenary in the Indochina War, said many winning athletes from top medal winners China, Japan and South Korea came to his restaurant to eat during the games.

His menu featured exotic dishes including cobra's blood and cobra's gall bladders. "They came to my restaurant at night after the games and ordered cobra, either in soup, in curry, or fried, he told Reuters. But they usually have the gall bladder fresh, mixed with blood and whiskey." SAY WHAT!!!!!!

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TRIVIA ANSWER: In 1951 in New Delhi, India, N.C. KOK of Singapore won the 1500-meter free-style swimming event. He went on to win all four free-style swimming events for four gold medals.

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