Young Koreans overcome UAE 2-0 in prep game before Olympic football qualifier
Hwang Hee-chan / Yonhap
By Nam Hyun-woo
Korea’s Olympic football team on Tuesday clinched a 2-0 win over the United Arab Emirates (UAE) under-23 team, in a tune-up match before Asian U-23 Championship, which will be the qualifier to the Rio Olympics football.
During the game at Maktoum Bin Rashid Al Maktoum Stadium in Dubai, Korea’s head coach Shin Tae-yong took an experimental approach, applying various formations, and sent 21 out of 23 players on the roster to the pitch to test whether the young Taeguk Warriors are ready to make it into top 3 in the tournament. The top three teams of the tournament will qualify for the Olympics men's football tournament.
In the first of two-game tune-up match series, Shin’s men were quite adoptive to their boss’ various order, with Lee Yeong-jae and Hwang Hee-chan scoring in the second half, but also saw their problems in finding the balance between attacking and defending numbers as well as controlling the back line.
In the cagey first half, the most impressive moment was Ulsan Hyundai FC young gun Kim Seung-joon’s wasting of a point-blank open chance in the 33rd-minute. Other than that, their underwhelming first half performance forced Shin to ponder upon the problems in the remaining days.
As the Koreans put more focus on clinching an early lead, with both sides’ full-backs seemingly neglecting their defensive duty, their back lines were oftentimes outnumbered when the UAE was on counter attack, while midfielders were not agile enough to cover the empty spaces in flanks.
Midfielders were not successful in compressing the space between defense and midfield, while their attacking efforts were also not rewarding, with the UAE possessing the ball 53 percent.
Shin replaced six, including goalkeeper, in the beginning of the second half -- the game had no limit in substitution -- and the huge change soon added a spice in the game.
Kim in the 58th minute created havoc in the box, but was lack of accuracy in providing decisive passes.
Two minutes later, striker Jin Seong-uk received a long ball from deep back and eked out pressure from four UAE defenders to feed a cut-back pass to withdrawn forward Lee Yeong-jae, who directly launched a left-footed shot into the right of bottom of the UAE’s goal.
After the goal, the Koreans’ pumped up their attacking momentum, with their build-up process picking up more speed. During the efforts, Austrian Red Bull Salzburg’s 19-year-old budding forward Hwang Hee-chan shone, showcasing his grit for the ball.
And his effort paid back in the 87th minute, as Kwon Chang-hoon, who also continues his stint for the senior national team, exploited a sloppy UAE clearing and found Hwang on the other side to provide a perfect feed.
“It was a bit tough game,” Shin said. “However, our players were decisive in the second half and clinched a win. It will be a morale boost for them.”
The Koreans will next face Saudi Arabia on Thursday in their final prep match before the Asian U-23 Championship in Qatar Jan. 12-30. At the tournament, Korea is in Group C with Uzbekistan, Iraq and Yemen.