Asiad football champs retain gold after beating North Korea

Hair-raising: Japan’s Momoko Tanikawa (right) celebrates with teammate Haruka Osawa after scoring the third goal of the match. — Reuters

JAPAN were booed but kept their cool in an “interesting” atmosphere to beat North Korea 4-1 and retain their Asian Games women’s football crown.

The crowd of over 35,000 in the Chinese city of Hangzhou was overwhelmingly in North Korea’s favour and booed the Japanese players when they went on the attack.