Korea left to play waiting game for Round of 32
Korean players jog before a training session for the FIFA World Cup at Chivas Verde Valle in Zapopan, Mexico, Thursday (local time). Yonhap
Korean fans were reduced to supporting Japan on Friday morning, in the hope that the old rival could help bring about a place in the Round of 32. In the end, the Samurai Blue did not defeat Sweden by the needed two goals. The 1-1 draw made Korea’s chances of squeezing through to the knockout stage a little less likely.
After the dismal 1-0 defeat to South Africa a day earlier, the Taeguk Warriors dropped into third-place in Group A and into a state of limbo of having to wait and see what happens elsewhere.
The top two teams from each of the 12 groups of four advance automatically into the Round of 32. There they are joined by eight of the best performing third-placed teams. This is where Korea currently finds itself and needs to rely on the results of others.
"I personally didn't want to end up in this kind of situation, where we have to wait and see if we will reach the knockouts,” Son Heung-min said. “It's disappointing that we didn't get the outcome we deserved, considering the amount of hard work we've done, but it's out of our hands now and we will have to accept our fate, whatever it will be."
That’s all Korea can do right now and the outcome is looking very uncertain. There is a table of the 12 third-placed teams that is becoming very familiar to fans that are studying it closely. There is a line that runs above the bottom four and it is a line that Korea does not want to fall below
The result and performance against South Africa were both terrible but at that point, Korea looked pretty good to go through in third place. Soccer data companies were predicting that the team had around a 90 percent chance. Results since however has dropped that percentage to, according to Opta, 54 percent
That is because on Friday morning, Ecuador beat Germany and Paraguay drew with Australia to move above Korea in that table. Those results mean it is going to be very close and it all depends on what happens elsewhere.
At the moment, the team is sixth with Algeria in seventh and Scotland in eighth providing the cushion. Algeria, however, still has a game to play and will move above Korea if it avoids defeat against Austria and that will probably happen as a draw will also be enough for the European team to advance.
If that happens then the cushion will be uncomfortably thin. Starting on Saturday morning, Senegal will move above Korea with a win against Iraq by two goals. The African champion has disappointed a little but will be expecting to defeat Iraq, who have lost both games 3-1 and 4-1. If Iran draws against Egypt it will be in third and above Korea.
Cape Verde will also move above Korea if the Africans, who have drawn with Spain and Uruguay, draw against Saudi Arabia though that won’t be a problem if Spain beat Uruguay. Then it will also be bad news if the Democratic Republic of Congo beat Uzbekistan.
So Korea needs Asian rivals Iraq and Uzbekistan to help. It is going to be close. It shouldn't have come to this but this is where we are.