South Korea Qualifies for World Cup 2022

Another team has qualified for the FIFA World Cup 2022 from the third and fourth round of the AFC qualifiers in the form of South Korea. The national team has claimed a spot for the final tournament of the Qatar Games following their 2-0 win in the Group A after they defeated Syria on Tuesday. 

Being the newly qualified team from AFC, they will be joining Iran who recently secured their own spot on Thursday, the two teams will join the automatically qualified team and the host nation Qatar representing the region of Asia.

The only spot left is the third spot in Group A and a spot in the qualifying playoffs that will be played against South America’s best. As for the Group B, the table is still open for the three teams that are still in the competition to bag the remaining spot for the World Cup, this was after Japan defeated Saudi Arabia with a 2-0 win.

Here are some of the important events that happened from the Match 8 of the AFC qualifiers. Meanwhile, you can bet on the upcoming qualifying matches on your favorite Asia bookie site.

Japan defeated Saudi Arabia at the end of the Group B match

Despite gaining six victories and a draw in their last seven matches, Saudi Arabia ended up suffering in their defeat in the hands of Japan as they gave in to the goals of Takumi Minamino and Junya Ito.  

Although their impressive record can be taken into account, Saudi Arabia is still struggling to qualify for the 2022 World Cup given how intense the competition is in the Asian qualifiers. Saudi Arabia still got one more game left in their schedule against Australia, however, at this point in the tournament, Japan is now in the lead to be qualified.

China’s defeat to Vietnam is shocking

Although right from the start, China PR has been the least favorite throughout the season and never had a realistic possibility of being qualified, their 3-1 defeat to Vietnam which is the team that they never lost to in the past is depressing.

Even though China was expected to at least defeat an opposition 24 positions below them in the FIFA world rankings, the team did not match the strength shown by Vietnam from the opening of the match and the resulting score is an indicator of how excellent the preparations are at My Dinh National Stadium.

South Korea’s effortless performance despite Son’s absence

Even without their excellent player Son Heung-min, South Korea still managed to secure a spot in the World Cup from their 10th match of the season, with their Tuesday win against Syria after their 1-0 win against Lebanon last Thursday.

Coach Paulo Bento definitely knows what he is doing by utilizing the strength of each member to bring them to the table. Players like Cho Gue-sung and Kwon Chang-hoon managed to shine on the football field following the lack of presence of Son-Heung-min, although they need to realize that the game is far from over and they still have a lot to do. 

The expectations were also high in the past World Cup even though South Korea was eliminated early in the tournament after their failure to Sweden and Mexico. Being expected to take the championship title, the team also has some of the best players on the field, South Korea needs to step up their game at the end of this year.

Final Words

Now that the Asian qualifiers are about to end, we witnessed how intense the competition is to qualify for the final tournaments of the World Cup. Now that we are only a few months away from the final tournament, being the second time the tournament was held in Asia, we hope that the next World Cup champion will be from the host nation’s region.