South Korea defended its gold medal in the women's team sabre fencing at the 18th Asian Games on Wednesday.

South Korea defeated China 45-36 at Jakarta Convention Center Cendrawasih Hall in Jakarta for its fourth fencing gold medal at these Asian Games.

The South Korean team of Kim Ji-yeon, Yoon Ji-su, Choi Soo-yeon and Hwang Seon-a came to Jakarta ranked fourth in the world, two spots above China.

Kim, Yoon and Hwang also won the 2014 gold medal together.

In team fencing, each match consists of nine individual bouts for three fencers, with one alternate. Each member of a team faces each member of the opposing team once. A head-to-head bout is three minutes long, but it ends when one team's score reaches a multiple of five. The objective is to get to 45 points first by the end of the ninth bout. But if neither side has 45 points at the end, the team with more points is declared the winner.

Qian Jian and Shao Yaqi of China took gold and silver in the individual event on Sunday, but neither could withstand the South Korean onslaught.

Qian defeated Kim in the individual semifinals, but Kim got the upper hand this time.

Shao faced Kim in the first bout and won the first four points. But Kim fought back with five consecutive points, and it was all South Korea over the next couple of bouts.

South Korea took a 20-14 lead into the fifth bout between Kim and Qian, a rematch of the individual semifinals from Sunday.

And Qian scored six straight points to pull China to a 20-20 tie, only to see Kim respond with her own 5-0 run to put South Korea up by 25-20.

In the next bout, Yang Hengyu erased that deficit for China and made it 28-28 against Yoon, who then scored the final three points of that bout to give South Korea a 30-28 advantage.

Choi then put the match out of reach for China in the next bout, outscoring Qian 5-1 for a 35-29 lead.

Yoon followed suit by beating Shao 5-1 in the next bout, and it was a comfortable 40-30 cushion with one bout remaining.

Kim was tasked with the role of the closer, and after some back-and-forth with Yang, Kim got the last five points the team needed for a nine-point victory.

South Korea came to Jakarta with the objective of winning eight gold medals in fencing. It collected three gold, two silver and four bronze medals in three days of individual events that ended Tuesday. (Yonhap)