Republic of Korea take Sabre gold - London Olympics 2012

Republic of Korea take men's Sabre Team gold

Junghwan Kim, Young Won Woo, Bongil Gu and Eunseok Oh of Korea celebrate with the gold medal after winning Men's Sabre Team Fencing on Day 7 of the London 2012 Olympic Games at Excel.

Republic of Korea added to their gold haul at the ExCeL by capturing the men's Team Sabre.

Seeded only sixth of the eight sides, they triumphed 45-26 over Romania in the final following earlier wins over Germany and Italy.

Prior to these Olympic Games, the Koreans had only ever won three Fencing medals, but this was their fifth of the week and second gold.

The Italians achieved their sixth - two of each colour - by taking bronze with a 45-39 win over Russia.

Gu Bongil, Won Woo Young and Kim Junghwan saw Republic of Korea almost to the finishing line and with the title in sight, Oh Eunseok came on so that he too could go home with a medal.

He justified their faith in him, beating Romanian substitute Alexandru Siriteanu 5-1 and then watched Won complete the job.

Italy were ranked seventh, but also beat second seeds Belarus before losing to the Koreans.

The Italians were silver medallists at Beijing 2008 and third at Athens 2004.

Aldo Montano, individual champion in Athens, and Luigi Tarantino were members of those sides as well, while Diego Occhiuzzi played last time and was the individual runner-up on Sunday.

Tarantino, 39, was left out of the bronze medal contest and substitute Luigi Samele became the star of the show, taking his three contests by a combined 19-14.

Montano, described as 'a phenomenon' by Occhiuzzi, had saved them against the Belarussians and said: 'I'll give all my heart to take a medal.

'That's why people love me because I'll make them love Fencing playing like that.'