China retains Universiade women's water polo title
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Xinhua, August 22, 2011
Hosts China successfully defended their women's water polo title at the Shenzhen Universiade on Monday, breezing past the United States 14-4 in the final.
Ma Huanhuan, one of the best scorers in the FINA Shanghai World Championships, opened the scoring for China only three minutes into the match and enjoyed a 9-0 lead in the first half.
The United States faced goal-drought until left-handed driver Nadia Dan made a hook shot in the third quater when China led 10-0. Though the hosts changed goalkeeper in the last period, the gap was too big for United States to chase up.
"We are not shamed at all to lose to such a strong team," said US head coach Matthew Anderson, "For our team right here, this team were group of players we are looking at for the 2016 Olympics."
As to the gold medal match, Anderson said they had opportunities to start game, but China had a very strong goalkeeper Yang Jun and they were "not able to get by".
Yang blocked eight of ten shots and all the five extra player shots in the first three periods, before she got replaced by Wang Ying in the last quater.
"It's hard to defend our title actually, because after we won in the Belgrade, every other teams will study and analyse our strategy and technology. So we regained our title by growing into a more mature team in both parts," said Chinese head coach Pan Shenghua.
Russia claimed bronze medal by beating Italy at 18-9 in bronze medal match.
"The matches here are very professional and helpful for us to cultivate our reserves. After all, we are satisfied with the results and of course we had the chance to win a better place," said Russian head coach Boris Ukhov.
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