China looks to 2008 after Macau successes
(Reuters)
Updated: 2005-11-07 22:14

China grabbed more than half the gold medals on offer at the East Asian Games in Macau but the most gratifying of those 127 victories came on Sunday when the men's team beat North Korea 1-0 in the soccer final.

"It is the first time that China has won a men's soccer title at an international multi-sports event," Xinhua news agency said of the victory in the event billed as a dress rehearsal for the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

China had already lost to North Korea in the group stages, but set up a gold-medal rematch after edging Japan 2-1 in the semi-finals.

Chinese officials, however, were quick play down the significance of the country's victories over regional rivals Japan and South Korea and the six other nations and territories taking part in the nine-day event.

"We sent our top athletes to Macau because we regard this as a very important rehearsal for the 2008 Olympics," Cui Dalin, China's deputy head of mission, was quoted as saying by Xinhua.

"Japan and South Korea didn't send their best."

China dominated most of the Olympic sports contested in Macau, with the nation's athletes shining on the track, taking 26 of the 45 golds on offer.

While the games were great news for China, residents of Macau have raised questions about the cost, which chief organizer Manuel Silverio has put at about $500 million, equal to almost one quarter of the island territory's revenues in 2004.

But Xinhua argued that the event, largely ignored outside East Asia, was worth it.

"By hosting the games, Macau has presented itself as more than a gambling enclave, and with 11 gold medals to its credit, the city of 470,000 dwellers has gone some way to challenging its reputation as a sporting nobody," Xinhua said.

The biggest news of the fourth East Asian Games came on Tuesday, when long-time political and sporting rivals South and North Korea agreed to compete as a single team at the 2006 Asian Games and at the 2008 Olympics in Beijing.