BANGKOK South Korea's Davis Cup members humiliated Japan in the men's team tennis final here yesterday, winning their first gold medal in the sport since 1986 at the Asian Games. Yoon Yong-Il put South Korea one up beating Satoshi Iwabuchi 6-1, 6-2, and Lee Hyung-Taik assured the gold medal by beating Hideki Kaneko 7-6 (7/3), 7-6 (7/4) in the best-of-three battle.

South Korea completed the sweep with Kim Dong-Hyun and Song Hyeong-Kern beating Takahiro Terachi and Onoda Michihisa 3-6, 6-2, 6-2. Lee's Victory task was made easier when Kaneko aggravated his right knee ligament in the second set with the score at 6-6. After treatment he came back to take a 2-0 lead in the tie-breaker but Lee fought back to win the second and then sealed victory by taking the third 7/4 in another tie-break.

My knee has been no good this year, but I felt it was not so bad this week. Probably I played favoring my knee. Suddenly I started to feel pain and I couldn't jump when I was serving, Kaneko said. I was leading 5-4. If I could have won the following game for 6-4, I believe I would have been able to win the match.

I was very, very disapointed, Lamented Kaneko still lying on the court side. In the first match Yoon easily beat Satoshi Iwabuchi 6-1, 6-2. The Japanese played well but the luck was with us today, said Yoon. Korean Coach Jeong Yong-Dai agreed. We were lucky that we defeated Uzbekistan yesterday and we were lucky to beat Japan today. Both matches were very tough.

We were helped also because India's Leander Paes did not come. (AFP)