From overtime heart attack against Uzbekistan to a semi-comfortable victory, in a span of 48 hours, Korea found themselves squarely in the drivers seat early, they knock out Vietnam with a comprehensive 1:3 victory in the Asian Games semis. They face either Japan or UAE on September 1st at the same stadium, Pakansari Stadium in Cibinong Indonesia.

Quick recap, Starting XI:

https://twitter.com/theKFA/status/1034704706432581632

Formation 4-3-2-1, changes to the side included Cho Yu-min at CB, holding mid Kim Jung-min for Lee Seung-mo and “San” Cho Hyun-woo recovering from his injury to return in between the sticks. Hwang Hee-Chan also included, providing some pace and urgency as Na Sang-ho returns to the bench. Rested: Hwang In-Beom, with Lee Seung-woo getting the nod for the start.

Starting on a fast gear, the game would continue with a blistering pace throughout, not what one would expect after both sides went a full 120 minutes in their quarterfinal encounters. The hope for both sides was to get a blitzkrieg goal early, but it was Korea who would notch first kill. In the 6th minute, Hwang Hee-chan driving right up the middle, found Hwang Ui-jo. He had trouble holding onto the ball at the top of the area, but the ball spilled out to Lee Seung-woo, who took a touch before blasting it into the upper left corner of the net.

Vietnam 0:1 Korea

Entering the 27th minute, Son Heung-min, squeezed in with 3 Vietnamese defenders around him, turned and with great vision, flicked on the ball to Hwang Ui-jo making a run behind the defense. Timed perfectly, the keeper panicked with no defenders in front of Hwang and tried to cut off his angle. Hwang dinked it over the keeper for his 9th goal of the tournament.

Vietnam 0:2 Korea

Korea enjoying a good run of possession in the final third, in a race, Son gets to it 1st, rounds the keeper but unable to find an outlet… — Tavern of the Taeguk Warriors (@taeguk_warrior) August 29, 2018

Vietnam attacks, looking very dangerous in the box but a Kim Min-jae intervention & timely tackle by Cho Yu-min snuffs out the attack — Tavern of the Taeguk Warriors (@taeguk_warrior) August 29, 2018

Lee Seung-woo writhing in pain, right knee…after a challenge, slid on the poor grass pitch surface…doesn’t look good — Tavern of the Taeguk Warriors (@taeguk_warrior) August 29, 2018

Halftime and Korea finally allows themselves some breathing room. It didn’t take long after the restart for Lee Seung-woo to pounce again.

https://twitter.com/taeguk_warrior/status/1034746622868168705

Vietnam 0:3 Korea

Kim Hak-bum started rotating players out, wise move considering the insane tournament compressed schedule. 59th minute, Hwang Ui-jo out for Na Sang-ho, and Son out for Lee Si-young in the 72nd minute, but not before Vietnam’s Tran Minh Vuong delivered a beauty of a freekick into the upper left net. Cho didn’t have a chance.

Vietnam 1:3 Korea

Lee Seung-woo led the attack in the absence of Son and Hwang Ui-jo, Korea and Vietnam kept up a wide open game right to the end, but Vietnam, which came uncomfortably close to getting their 2nd goal, just weren’t clinical enough to take advantage of a defense scrambling back to shape. Lee Jung-min played the Lee Seung-mo role of delivering cringe worthy mispasses, making things a bit more difficult for the backline.

Despite the scoreline, U23 Vietnam represented well, demonstrated by fast, physical and technical play, more so than the Vietnamese players of another older generation. It wasn’t enough however as Park Hang-seo’s side couldn’t get past an increasingly compact and defensive minded Korean team. 5 minutes of stoppage time ended and Korea’s players collapsed on the pitch in relief.

Fulltime: Vietnam 1:3 Korea

At time of writing, it’s Halftime 0:0 UPDATE: Japan 1 : 0 UAE late in 2nd half

Gold medal match: September 1st at 7:30am US EST/ 8:30pm Korea Time

Notes:

This was a game for Lee Seung-woo to shine, especially given how open the game was. Dribbling at his opponents, carving out space between defenders, his quick goal poaching instincts and clinical finish was again very reminiscent of his Barcelona academy days. The Hwang Hee-chan/Lee Seung-woo attacking partnership looked bright – another decent attacking outlet to compliment the Son/Hwang Ui-jo pairing. Kim Hak-bum risked a lot in rotating him out earlier in the quarterfinals – it’s paid off dividends with a fresh and energetic Lee today. Kim will also be praying that the injuries that Lee sustained (and having to be subbed out) will not be serious enough to exclude him from his title match game plans. He was walking around in post match celebrations, so perhaps that’s a good sign. 2 goals today, 3 goals in the tournament, Lee, like this squad, is heating up.

To balance out the good news, if it’s not Lee Seung-mo, then today it’s Kim Jung-min providing much discomfort with haphazard passing and generally subpar performance. His body language showed a lack of confidence. Terrifying to contemplate what could happen if opponent on Saturday were to exploit that weakness in the midfield effectively…

Korea playing with a much better understanding from back to front. They are on form simply because they seem to be learning from their mistakes as the tournament has progressed. It hasn’t been pretty, but team chemistry has evolved in a short span of time (they haven’t had much time to train pre-tournament). Son looked better from the perspective of his distributing and conducting things from a little further back than usual to keep the attack ticking and coordinated in a more cohesive fashion.

Speaking of Son, he may have gotten flack for turning his back on Hwang Hee-chan’s game winning penalty shot in overtime against Uzbekistan, but all that was yesterday’s forgotten problem. The gameplan was for Vietnam to swamp Son out of the game- and his job was to take advantage of that. The vision and instincts were spot on today, in particular, his lovely flick on for Hwang Ui-jo while Son was surrounded on all sides by Vietnamese defenders. The backline was completely caught out and the keeper left vulnerable for Hwang’s 9th goal. The goal scoring burden is not squarely on Son, and for a number of reasons, mental game included – that has been working as of late to Korea’s advantage. One slight negative: dribbling miscues were evident today, but will certainly weigh less because of the result. Son has quietly been effective, not in the way many would have predicted with far fewer goals to his name than Hwang Ui-jo and his other teammates, but when it’s clutch time, Captain Son has been and continues to be there for the squad.

Last but not least: fullbacks looked a bit more tired but steady overall. Jury on Cho Yu-min at CB: not bad today. San Cho in between the sticks couldn’t do anything about that superb Tran freeckick but otherwise was his usual solid self (one distribution mistake, but still overall solid).

Extra Time: Suwon Bluewings, whose longtime manager Seo Jung-won resigned nearly 24 hours before a crucial Asian Champions League quarterfinal clash with Jeonbuk Hyundai —they surprised everyone by dispatching Jeonbuk 3:0 in Jeonju! The managerless Bluewings will take a Dejan brace and Han Eui-gwon header goal back to Suwon on September 19th for the 2nd leg.

Korea’s Womens team represented well on Tuesday in their semifinal match with Japan. Lee Min-ah equalized in the 68th minute, but they went down 1:2 with a late own goal by Lim Seon-joo.

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