China again missed a clean sweep of seven gold medals in the table tennis tournament of the Asian Games, as the eight-day competitions in the Al Arabi Indoor Hall came to an end Thursday afternoon.

Paddlers from Hong Kong of China snatched the only gold missing from China's pocket, after Li Ching and Ko Lai Chak gave a shock 4-2 defeat to Olympic champions Ma Lin and Chen Qi to end China's winning streak in the Asian Games on Wednesday.

The Hong Kong pair, in a full display of gallantry, perseverance and confidence, won the Athens Olympic final rematch 11-8, 4-11,11-5, 11-4, 8-11, 11-7.

It's the first title won by Hong Kong in an Asiad table tennis men's event and second in history of both men's and women's. The only other gold was claimed by Cheung Yuk and Tie Yana four years ago in the mixed doubles in Busan.

"It's out of my expectation," said Li at a post-match press conference. "I had been thinking about a silver."

 "I think you can describe us as more than excellent," said Ko.

China did not take the failure as a shame, however.

"The Hong Kong duo played well and are one of the best pairs in the world," said Chinese head coach Liu Guoliang. "It's not a shame to be beaten by them."

"I'm still seeking a better pairing for the Beijing Olympic Games, which will cancel the men's and women's doubles events and replace those with team events," added Liu, referring to the changes made to the Olympic Games.

In 32 years since China's table tennis team made its debut in the Asian Games, they managed only once in Bangkok in 1978 a clean sweep of all the seven events.

"It's a sore deeply in mind for China to miss so many chances of clean-sweeping the table tennis golds in the Asian Games since 1978," said team leader Huang Biao.

The all-conquering Chinese team have swept the men's and women's team titles last Sunday and its newly-combined women's doubles pair Guo Yue and Li Xiaoxia beat Wednesday Hong Kong's Tie Yana and Zhang Rui 4-1 to China's third table tennis title, while Ma Lin and Wang Hao set up an all-Chinese final of the men's singles.

On Thursday afternoon, it was all about China who celebrated triple victories in the mixed doubles, women's singles and men's singles final.

Former world champions Ma Lin and Wang Nan won the mixed doubles final against newly-combined Lee Jung Woo and Lee Eun Hee after denying a late comeback from the South Koreans.

The women's singles title went to China's teenage paddler Guo Yue, who managed to hold her nerves to rally past veteran Tie Yanaof Hong Kong, China 4-3 to claim her first victory in major tournament.

Wang Hao won the final between teammates for the men's singles gold.

Editor: Donald