South Korea dashed Malaysia’s dreams of claiming a gold medal in the 2018 Asian Games women’s team of six event on Friday.

Shalin Zulkifli, Sin Li Jane, Esther Cheah, Syaidatul Afifah Badrul Hamidi, Siti Safiyah Amirah Abdul Rahman and Natasha Roslan had to settle for a silver as they failed to end Malaysia’s 12-year gold drought in the event when they recorded 8149 pinfalls at the Jakabaring Bowling Centre.

The South Korean team of Baek Sungja, Han Byul, Kim Hyun Mi, Lee Yeonji, Ryu Seoyeon and Lee Nayoung claimed the gold medal with 8338 pinfalls.

Chinese Taipei’s Pan Yu-Fen, Chou Chia-Chen, Tsai Hsin-Yin of Chinese, Chang Yu-Hsuan, Wang Ya-Ting and Huang Chiung-Yao took bronze with 7969 pinfalls.



Earlier, in the first block of three games, Malaysia were in second place with 4024 pin falls, 67 points behind the Koreans.

They managed to reduce the deficit to 17 pins in the fourth game, but the Koreans showed their prowess to increase the lead all the way towards the end for the gold.

Malaysia only claimed gold in the team event (previously team of five) once during the 2006 Doha Games, with Esther and Shalin being the two bowlers remaining from the squad, while at the 2010 Guangzhou edition, Malaysia claimed bronze.

On Wednesday, the women's trio of Esther, Syaidatul Afifah and Siti Safiyah Amirah claimed the first 2018 Asian Games gold medal for Malaysia, ending a 24-year drought in the event at the same time.

On Thursday, the men’s trio of Rafiq Ismail, Timmy Tan Chye Chern and Ahmad Muaz Fishol won a silver medal.