The second round of the women's heat of the "Good Luck Beijing" 2007 International Hockey Tournament started in the Olympic Green Hockey Field this morning, with host China pitted against South Africa. After winning the powerful Argentine team 3:0 yesterday, the Chinese team fighting on home soil claimed another 3:0 victory over the South African team, the African champions. After the match Kim Changback, head coach of the Chinese team, expressed his satisfaction with the result. "However," he said, "I'm not quite satisfied with the whole course of the match!" Talking about the turf problem for some teams including Australia who thought the turf in the pitch was a bit too soft, Kim said he would not think so and such synthetic turf, knwon as Type 2008, is to the advantage of the Chinese team.

Commenting on his team's performance today, Kim said as the South African team was relatively weak, the Chinese players somewhat slackened their efforts during the play. Though three goals were scored in a row in the second half, he was still dissatisfied with the way the match was played.

Speaking of their Olympic preparations, Kim said all participating teams will strive for top honours. After the competitions in the last few months, his team has run in quite well as a team. With the support and care of the state government, the Handball, Hockey, Baseball and Softball Administrative Center, fans and media friends, he said, the national women's hockey team will spare no effort in achieving good results at next year's Olympic Games.

Tomorrow will be a rest day for the tournament. China will compete with Australia, its third rival in the group preliminaries, on August 11. At present, both teams have entered the finals with two wins. "In the first half of this year we played two matches with Australia," said Kim, "now that both teams have entered the finals, I believe our guest team will not exert all their strength the day after tomorrow. For the same reason, we will also regard the final showdown on August 13 as the most important! The game with Australia will be a rehearsal for our tactics," he added.

As to the complaint made by the Australian head coach about the turf, Kim Changback explained that there are two types of turf for a hockey pitch, 2000 and 2008, and the density of Type 2000 reaches 50% while that of Type 2008 80%. As Type 2008, which has just been developed, is used in the current tournament, the high density of the turf results in the fast speed of the ball. As Chinese players are used to the fast play, the use of this brand-new turf actually makes no difference. As Kim put it, "I believe other teams including Australia will soon follow suit and use this kind of turf for future competitions."