Li Hong opening the scoring for China after catching a no look pass from midfielder Ying Zhang and netting another 16 minutes later from a penalty corner.

“This is extremely important for us, to have reached the quarters,” China coach Alyson Annan told reporters.

“We knew it would be difficult, but we thought that we were capable of making the quarterfinals. Once you’re in there, anything can happen.”

The top-seeded Netherlands trounced Japan 5-1 in Pool A, sinking their hopes of stealing the quarterfinal spot from China as the tournament’s leading scorer Yibbi Jensen found the net for the seventh time on a penalty stroke.

Australia finished top of Pool B with a 3-1 victory over Spain, forward Alice Arnot getting her third goal of the tournament by deflecting home cross from midfielder Mariah Williams.

“We know we don’t want to go up against the Dutch in the semifinal. We wanted to make sure that we were going into our quarterfinal top of the table,” Williams said.

Argentina also claimed a final Pool B win 3-0 over Britain with back to back goals early in the third quarter but fell a goal short of top spot on differential.

Heavy rain soaked the players and fans in the late game as Belgium beat Germany 2-0 to finish second in Pool A and push German down to third.

In the quarterfinals, the Netherlands will play Britain and Australia face China. Belgium meet Spain and Argentina take on Germany.