Sloppy Japan beat hosts Korea in Asia Championship opener

(Reuters) - Japan beat South Korea 56-30 in the inaugural Asia Rugby Championship at Incheon on Saturday but their bonus-point win failed to impress coach Eddie Jones who criticised his team's "rubbish" performance. Hayden Hopgood contributed two tries while six of his team mates supplied one each as Japan ran in five more tries than the hosts' three, including two from Jang Seong Min, at the Namdong Asiad Rugby Field. "We were a bit rusty both individually and as a team, and sloppy for most parts of the game," Jones was quoted as saying by the Kyodo news agency. "Korea played well for the first 30 minutes and we gave them some points which got their spirits up. They were physical and tackled well." Fullback Jang scored the opening try as Korea raced to a 17-3 lead after 16 minutes but Japan hit back through flanker Hopgood while winger Chihito Matsui also scored a try on his 15s debut to put his team 22-20 ahead at halftime. Japan broke loose in the second half with Karne Hesketh, Yu Tamura, Yoshikazu Fujita, Ryu Koliniasi Holani, Justin Ives and Hopgood running in tries to seal the victory for the Brave Blossoms. "To be honest the only thing I was really disappointed in was the attitude," Jones said. "If we had prepared simply to play Korea -- and not to be disrespectful -- we would have won by 80 points and not learnt anything. "In terms of the Asia Rugby Championship we were rubbish, but as far as our Rugby World Cup preparations are concerned that was the best game we could have had. Our focus is the World Cup." South Korea meet Hong Kong in their next match on next Saturday. (Reporting by Amlan Chakraborty in New Delhi; editing by Sudipto Ganguly)