Taking place at the 974 Stadium, Doha, Qatar, the Brazilian national team will face Asian representatives, South Korea. The match for tickets to the 2022 World Cup quarter-finals between the two teams will take place on Tuesday. South Korea advanced to the last 16 of the World Cup with Runder-Up Grub H status after beating Portugal 2-1, Taeguk Warriors won 16th place due to superior goal productivity from Uruguay, who both have 4 points.
The Asian team won the top 16 ticket because of their goal productivity (4-4) compared to Uruguay (2-2). Meanwhile, at the bottom of the Grub H standings there is Ghana with a value of 3 points. While the Brazilian national team has the status of Grub G champion after appearing dominant in the preliminary round, even though in the last game Brazil had to lose to Cameroon, this did not affect the Selecao.
Thiago Silva and the team are still at the top of the standings and managed to qualify for the round of 16 since the second game. Finishing as grub champion with six points made Brazil even more flashy advancing to the last 16 against South Korea. As a star-studded grub, Brazil doesn’t usually take South Korea for granted. It is possible that South Korea will surprise Brazil like what they have done for Portugal.
Quoted from K Leauge Unitet, Brazilian national team coach Tite said that his team should not underestimate South Korea. “Portugal lost to South Korea, France from Tunisia and Argentina were humiliated by Saudi Arabia. No one has progressed perfectly in the three previous grub parties,”
At the 2022 World Cup there were indeed many surprises from Asian teams, therefore Asian representatives like South Korea should not be underestimated by their opponents. South Korea certainly has high spirits and is motivated by their neighboring country, Japan, which was able to topple the two European giants, Germany and Spain.
This was proven by the ferocity of South Korea when it was able to beat the national team of the mega star Cristiano Ronaldo, Portugal had to recognize the greatness of South Korea. “I think they are a strong team, difficult matches will happen. We have to be very careful,” continued Tite.
Even though Brazil is currently in first place in the FIFA rankings while South Korea is ranked 28th, this does not mean that Brazil will be able to beat South Korea easily. “If we played Brazil in a tournament, I would say Brazil would be champions. But in one match, it’s not like a tournament. We have one chance. We have to respect the result,” said the South Korean coach quoted by Yonhap News Agency on Monday.
Statistically, Paulo Bento’s squad is always overshadowed by defeat, most recently this year in a friendly match, South Korea had to lose 5-1 to Brazil. Moreover, later in the Brazil squad, their main player, Neymar, will appear after going through two matches in the grub phase due to injury.
“As for Neymar, he will train this afternoon and if he is okay, he will play tomorrow,” said Brazil coach Tite. Brazil could have had the same fate as Germany at the 2018 World Cup, at that time South Korea, which was still led by Shin Tae-yong, managed to humiliate Germany in the Grub G preliminary round which then made the European giants fail to advance to the next round, South Korea managed to win with a score 2-0.
Meanwhile, Brazil has a dark record against Germany in the 2014 World Cup. At that time, the five-time World Cup winners were entrusted with being the hosts, but unfortunately they had to endure the embarrassment because they were defeated by Germany at home. In the 2014 World Cup semi-finals to be precise, Germany rained down on Brazil with a landslide score of 7-1.
It is not impossible that if South Korea can beat Germany, who have beaten Brazil by conceding many goals, then South Korea will also be able to overthrow Brazil later to win a ticket to the quarter-finals.
Not only have Germany been defeated, South Korea also has another sweet record at the World Cup, when co-hosting Japan at the 2022 World Cup, the Taeguk Warriors at that time were able to advance to the semi-finals and they were able to beat the giants from Europe, Italy in quarter-finals.
South Korea is a formidable opponent that Brazil must watch out for, even though they are five times World Cup Winners, this does not rule out the possibility of being toppled by the Asian representative, as long as the ball is still round and keeps spinning, during that time there is still a chance for South Korea to win.
Let’s look forward to what surprises will be given by South Korea for Brazil or Brazil which will bury South Korea’s dream of moving on to the next round.
ASL
