China's ice hockey head coaches have appealed for help to improve their slumping teams.

At the Sixth Asian Games in Changchun the women's team struggled to finish third out of five, while the men's team were only able to come fourth.

"The first thing for China to improve is that we need more skaters," said Jorma Siitarinen, the Finnish coach of the women's team. "We have only one team and we only have about fifty or forty players. This is what the sports officials must think about."

There is currently only one women's team and three men's teams in the country, according to sports officials.

"The lack of the play has affected the normal training of the team very much," said Siitarinen, who took over the team five months ago.

"The biggest problem is that we don't have games against women. They played two weeks ago in Harbin with men's teams. We now have three months in which we have no games against a women's team."

The women's ice hockey team used to be strong, winning the Asian Winter Games in 1996 and 1999 and finishing fourth at the 1998 Nagano Winter Olympic Games. But in recent years the team has gone backwards, and in 2006 reached a low when they failed to qualify for the 2006 Turin Winter Olympics.

They are now rebuilding, but it is a slow process: "We have a very young team. They must learn to play," said Siitarinen.

"We have very strong players but they are not enough good yet. The biggest problem is we don't have enough good defensive players."

The men's team has also hired a foreign coach to turn their fortunes around.

"It's very hard for the Chinese team now since we need more players and more coaches," said Jarmo Jamalainen, also from Finland, who has been with the team less than a month.

"But the Asian Games was only practice for us. Our main goal is the World Championships this April.

"I know more about the team now and I believe we will achieve better results then."

(China Daily February 6, 2007)