China Downs Yugoslavia 10-0 in World Ice Hockey

Four Chinese players scored twice as China eased to a 10-0 victory over Yugoslavia Tuesday night, setting a showdown with Lithuania to decide the winner of Group C at the ongoing World Ice Hockey Pool C Championships here. Pan Yuqiang opened the scoring for China 3:47 into the game by slamming home a pass from Liu Lei. Liu scored two goals in succession at 9:00 and 13:07 and Chinese captain Wu Guofeng added one to help China finish the first period 4-0.

After the game resumed, Wu found the net again and Luo Lei had his first goal as China increased the margin to 7-0. Yugoslavia's effort to get a consolation goal in the third period turned out to be a failure while Luo and Pan scored their second goals to seal the scoreboard with 10-0.

"I am satisfied with the result as well as all the players' performance," said China's head coach Wang Jingang. "We will try to use our speed advantage in tomorrow's crucial match against Lithuania."

The host Chinese, who finished third in each of the last two Pool C Championships and aimed at top three finishes here, will play Lithuania which topped Yugoslavia 8-0 on Monday. In other matches played Tuesday, Shim Eui-Sik and Park Kyu-Ho scored two goals apiece to lead South Korea past Spain 10-3 and Croatia dumped Bulgaria 11-0.

South Korea will face Hungary and Croatia is to play Romania on Wednesday, struggling to finish top in Group A and B respectively. According to the competition rules, top team from each group in the primary round will vie for top three places at the nine-squad tournament.

Spain, Croatia and Yugoslavia, all finishing third in each group with nil points from two losses, will kick off a round-robin Thursday to decide the seventh to the ninth places.

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