World No. 10 Korea rallied twice to beat defending champions Thailand in a very close five-setter (22-25, 26-24, 23-25, 27-25, 15-13) to take the bronze medal.

Korea ace Kim Yeon Koung topped all scorers with an impressive 38 points –37 spikes and one block – followed by Kim Hee Jin with 19 points. Jung Dae Young and Yoon Hye Suk added 12 and 11, respectively. Thailand’s fierce spiker Onuma Sittirak gained 26 points for her team, followed by captain Wilavan Apinyapong with 22 and T. Pleumjit with 16. Korea held the advantage in blocks (8-5) while Thailand held an 10-5 advantage in service aces. In attacks, Korea had the edge 81-76 and made 19 errors compared with 21 by Thailand.

Informaiton from FIVB

Taipei, Chinese Taipei, September 22, 2011 – China stunned Korea in four sets(25-14, 25-20, 21-25, 25-16) to set up a gold-medal clash against Japan at the 16th Asian Senior Women's Volleyball Championship.on Thursday.

China's services proved to be more destructive today as they had 11 points on serves. Their top scorer was Hui Ruoqi with 20 points, followed by Wang Yimei, 17 points, and Yang Junjing, 15 points. Korea's ace Kim Yeon Koung, also showed her firepower with 21 points, followed by middle blocker Jun Dae Young with 11 points.

China led throughout the first set as their blocks almost disabled Korea from spiking, and Korea's middle blockers had a hard time to score. The Korean Ace, Kim Yeon Koung, had to find chances to snatch points from China with her back attacks. With one quick spike of Yang Junjing, China sealed the set 25-14.

The second set began again with China leading, as Yang Junjing continued to undermine Korea's first pass with her powerful serves. China had up to a 6-point lead at 20-14, but Korea managed to keep up to 20- 25 and then yielded the set to China.

Korea, two sets behind China, fought with all their might in the third set, and they led 6-3 as Kim Yeon Koung had a serve that hit straight on Hui Ruoqi. China, on the other hand, leveled the scores at 12-12 with Yang Junjing's destructive serves. The seesaw carried on, till Kim Yeon Koung finally led her team to win the set 25-21 and to escape losing the match.

However, as Wang Yimei had two aces in a row, China started the lead in the fourth and the last set. Meanwhile Korea, shattered by Xu Yun Li's equally aggressive serves, lost four points in a series of reception errors, enabling China to maintain a 10-point lead at 19-9. The set and the match ended with Wang Yimei's two smacks, and Korea were only able to gain 16 points in the last set.

Information form AVC