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Paulo Bento was seeing red, quite literally, after his side’s defeat to Ghana on Monday night.
His South Korean side had thrown everything at Ghana in a frantic 10 minutes of stoppage time at the end of a frantic 90 minutes of football.
Having earned one final corner after Kwon Kyung-won’s slightly ambitious long-range effort was deflected wide, Korea were denied the chance to snatch a dramatic equaliser when the referee blew for full time before the corner could be taken.
The Korean players were incandescent with rage, their fury matching their bright red shirts. So too was Bento. He stormed onto the pitch with one person directly in his crosshairs, with the referee showing him a red card for his outburst.
It means he will miss Korea’s final World Cup group stage match against, of all teams, his home nation, Portugal.
As frustrating as the missed opportunity was, in reality Korea have only themselves to blame and having peppered the Ghanaian defence with cross after cross after cross, would one more have made the difference?
Maybe it would, we’ll never know, but this was another game in which Korea’s profligacy in front of goal came back to bite them.
When you look up the definition of efficient in the dictionary, you’re unlikely to see a picture of this Korean national team. Korea enjoyed 12 corners to Ghana’s five, plus an infinite number of crosses into the area, but their inability to turn those opportunities into shots on target was their ultimate undoing.
Ghana, meanwhile, had six shots for three goals. That’s efficiency.
It was Bento’s side who made all the early running again, with the full backs getting high up the pitch, and Korea getting repeat phases of possession to attack.
But they were undone by two goals in the space of 10 mins, both coming from lax defending from crosses into area that were in stark contrast to consistently poor delivery Korea were offering up at the other end.
It took the introduction of Lee Kang-in to spark Korea back into life in the second, with his introduction in the 56th minute having an immediate impact. No sooner had he arrived on the pitch he delivered an inch-perfect cross from Cho Gue-sung, who came into the side for Hwang Ui-jo, with the Jeonbuk striker heading home to give Korea hope.
Three minutes later Korea were level. Again Lee was instrumental, and again it was Cho Gue-sung who headed home, this time from a Kim Jin-su cross, to breath fire back into the Taegeuk Warriors.
Ultimately they would be undone by more lax defending, on 68 minutes, when Kim Jin-su allowed Mohammed Kudus to ghost in behind unmarked to sidefoot Ghana back into the lead.
Despite a barrage of late crosses that felt like a tidal wave, there was no way through and their hopes of progression to the Round of 16 hang in the balance ahead of their final clash with Portugal later in the week.
WHAT WE LEARNED
Lee Kang-in the game changer Korea needs: Can you believe that there was a period of time where it looked almost certain Lee Kang-in wouldn’t be selected for this World Cup? His introduction changed the game for Korea and within minutes Korea were level. His energy, liveliness, creativity was exactly what Korea required, and on another day he could’ve had a goal of his own. The dilemma for Bento is now whether he starts him against Portugal
Variety is the spice of life: For the final 10 minutes of the game Korea sent in a barrage of crosses to try to breach the Ghanaian defence, all of which was to no avail. It was the same tactic they had tried throughout the first half, again to no avail. While it was from two such occasions that they ultimately scored, they need to find more dimensions to their attack lest they become one-dimensional and easy to defend.
Defensive lapses costly: After a stellar first up defensive display against Uruguay in which they kept the likes of Luis Suarez, Darwin Nunez and Federico Valverde relatively quiet, Korea’s back four undid all their good work with a series of errors they’d love to do over. Unfortunately for Kim Jin-su he was at fault for two of them, losing his man twice and it was those moments that ultimately cost Korea.
WHAT THEY SAID
Post-match reaction to follow
WHAT COMES NEXT
Korea’s final group stage game comes against Portugal, again at the Education City Stadium. Nothing but a win will be good enough for Korea, so we will need to see more adventure – and quality – if Korea are to continue their journey in Qatar.
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