Defending champion South Korea settled for the bronze medal after beating China 12-2 in the baseball tournament of the 15th Asian Games here on Wednesday.

China got a bad start when Jog Keun Woo and Lee Yong Kyu walked to the second and first bases after some errant pitching from ChenJunyi. Jeong stole to the third base and completed the run when Lee Byung Kyu singled. An error from shortstop Hou Fenglian led to two more runs by South Korea in the first.

The South Koreans kept up the pressure by scoring another three runs in the second and two more runs in the third with Park Ki Hyuk scoring against another error by Hou.

China responded at top of the fourth inning when Wang Wei hit a two-run home run but another run from Lee Yong Kyu made South Korea lead 9-2 after five innings.

South Korea scored in the next three innings and ended the game 12-2 after seven innings by the 10-run mercy rule.

"We did not play to our potential in today's match," said Chinese pitcher Lu Jiangang. "It was not normal. There are several factors. It is hard to say. The team, including the coaches, are all very young, and we don't have enough experience."

Shen Wei, who is in charge of China's baseball affairs, said that the absence of some injured leading Chinese pitchers from the Games was one of the reasons that the Chinese squad did not play well. The pitchers' inability to control the balls was another reason, she said.

The Chinese team, with two wins and three defeats, ended fourth in the tournament of the Doha Asian Games.

In another game of the day, Thailand beat the Philippines 8-1 for the fifth place.

Chinese Taipei and Japan, both four-four in the previous games, will meet in a gold medal decider on Thursday.