South Korea remain confident despite losing Ki
South Korea’s Asian Cup hopes have suffered a blow after Premier League midfielder Ki Sung-yueng was ruled out of the tournament with a hamstring injury.
The 29-year-old Newcastle United player managed less than an hour before being taken off during South Korea’s opening win over the Philippines in Dubai.
Ki’s withdrawal was announced as South Korea, twotime winners of the tournament and the 2015 runners-up, prepare to take on Bahrain in the round of 16 today.
The pull-out has prompted speculation that Ki may announce his international retirement, after clocking up more than 100 appearances since making his debut in 2008.
The Koreans go into the match at the Rashid Stadium in Dubai with a 100 per cent record so far in the tournament.
As well as winning all three of their games on their way to topping Group C, Paulo Bento’s side are yet to concede a goal.
Bento is aware that the Koreans are serious contenders to win the tournament for a third time, but he also knows they still have tough competition if they are to be crowned champions at Zayed Sports City in Abu Dhabi on February 1.
“We know that we are candidates but I we are not the only favourites in this competition,” he said yesterday.
Bento said he was looking to take the momentum of the group stages, with Tottenham Hotspur’s Son Heung-min now part of the squad having missed the first two games, into their clash with Bahrain.
“It’s always good motivation to win all the games in the group stage,” said Bento. “All the victories that we achieved were without conceding goals, so that shows the consistency of the team.
“We will try in this next phase of the competition to play with the same confidence and try to do our best to reach the quarter-finals.”
If South Korea enjoyed an assured passage through to the last 16, then Bahrain’s was considerably less so.
They were heading out of the competition until Jamal Rashid scored a 90th-minute against India last Monday to give them a 1-0 victory in their final Group A game.
That put them to the knockout stages for the first time since 2004 as one of the best third-placed sides and manager Miroslav Soukup believes that his team will not have played for eight days when they take to the field today could give them an advantage .
“After our last game against India, we had six days to prepare our team, so we are not tired,” he said.
“I hope that we can repeat our performance against India, maybe the game will not be easy for South Korea and will be dramatic.”
Soukup added that he was pushing his players hard and believed they were capable of causing a surprise by eliminating the South Koreans from the competition.
“We are giving ourselves motivation because nobody is pressuring us,” he added. “My team has worked really hard in the preparation.
“We are pressuring ourselves, because my players are hungry to achieve results and they are ready.”