Midfielder Zhou Haibin scored the only goal to give China a 1-0 win over Iraq while Japan edged past Pakistan 3-2 in the second round of men's soccer event at the Doha Asian Games in Doha yesterday.

Zhou drove a well-taken half volley from 22 meters past goalkeeper Mohammed Khadum after Iraqi defender failed to clear the cross by Shen Longyuan.

"I'm very satisfied with the victory. Sun Ke's send-out really posed big problems for us, but finally we made it," said China boss Ratomir Dujikovic.

"Our leftback Sun Xiang will come back for the next match against Malaysia and will do us good help."

"Our training conditions were very bad and lead to the low form of our players," explained Iraq coach Yahya Manhel.

"We have to make big efforts for qualifying for the next round. And it would be very difficult for us."

Veteran coach Ratomir Dujikovic's men had more ball possession in the first half. Iraq created a better chance. Wang Dalei deniedKarrar Muhamed on two occasions when the in-form keeper caught a sharp header and shut out the Iraqi left winger on a one-to-one situation.

China was reduced to ten men four minutes before the interval, when leftback Zhang Ke received his second yellow card.

Iraq piled on the pressure to their rivals in the second half when Muaad Saleem fired a powerful low drive against the side net inside the box.

China's best chance came after 61 minutes when skipper Zheng Zhi made a quick foray down the left flank before feeding a smart back pass to find an unmarked Zhou, who shot the ball too high.

Gao Lin nearly doubled the advantage for China in the 75th minute, only to find his left foot shot fly over the bar.

Japan frustrated a brave Pakistan side during the match but the win was somewhat embarrassing.

Japan dominated the first half and opened the scoring two minutes into the game when Keisuke Honda slotted in a comfortable goal in front of a sloppy Pakistan defence.

Hiroyuki Taniguchi produced a brace in the 32rd and 57th minutes and a slaughter seemed to be unavoidable.

But Pakistan were not so easy to be daunted. They made strong efforts to find the target. Muhammad Rasool pulled one back in the 61st minute and continued their attacking. Naveed Akram drove home eight minutes before the final whistle to further boost the morale.

However, Japan didn't give their opponents any chance to get three points.

In Wednesday's other matches, India drew with Hong Kong, China 1-1; Oman beat Malaysia 3-1; Iran downed Maldives 3-1; DPR Korea tied Syria 0-0.