China determined to beat Iran in U-23 group game, says captain

BANGKOK - China has to win their last AFC U-23 group game against Iran on Wednesday for the sake of their dignity, said Chinese side captain Chen Binbin.

China lost their first two group games to South Korea (1-0) and Uzbekistan (2-0) successively to have missed out on the chance to qualify for this year's Tokyo Olympic Games.

"It is a shame that we could not make it, but now we can do nothing about it," Chen said.

"We will try our best to win the last match against Iran, it is about our dignity. We are determined to win it," added the 21 year old.

Chen rued his team's underperformance as well as well as the injury forced absence of their ace striker Zhang Yuning.

"I found nothing special about our opponents in the matches; it is mainly due to our underperformance. We did not bring out our best," he said.

He said China had to change their tactics after Zhang was stretchered off for a fifth metatarsal fracture in their first group match against South Korea.

"His injury was a blow to us. What a regret. We had to change the way of our play because of that," said the Chinese skipper.

Zhang has been flown back to China to receive treatment.