India were in for a battle for the wooden spoon after being thrashed 4-1 by Korea in a play-off for the 9-12 places at the women's field hockey World Cup in Madrid on Friday.

All the four Korean goals, including a brace by Park Young Soon, came in the first period while the lone Indian goal by Toppo came with five minutes remaining for the buzzer.

Park Mi Hyun opened the scoring in the 23rd minute before Kim Jung Hee doubled the lead in the 26th.

Soon then piled on the agony on the Indians with her twin strikes in the space of three minutes to make it 4-0 for the Koreans within half an hour of the start.

India, who are yet to post a win in the 12-nation event, will now play South Africa [Images] who went down to China 3-0.

Netherlands vs Argentina and Australia [Images] vs Spain was the semifinal line up later in the day.

USA shocked Germany [Images] 1-0 in the play-offs for the 5-8 places, knocking the Olympic [Images] champions out of Champions Trophy reckoning.

The Americans, who triumphed through Tiffany Snow's lone goal, will take on Japan [Images] in the fight for the fifth spot.

Japan outsmarted England [Images] 2-0 with goals from Kaori Chiba and Sakae Morimoto.

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