‘Positive about future’: women’s football coach
The ticket to the women’s football tournament at the Tokyo Olympics looked to be within South Korea’s grasp on Tuesday, as they opened up a two-goal lead over China in the first half of the final qualifying match.
Having dropped the first leg of the playoffs by 2-1 last Thursday, South Korea needed to win by 2-0, 3-1 or 3-2, and so forth. A goal by Kang Chae-rim and a Chinese own goal gave South Korea an early 2-0 lead in the match and a 3-2 edge in the aggregate score.
South Korea were 45 minutes away from qualifying for the Olympics for the first time, but Chinese midfielder Wang Shuang single-handedly destroyed that dream.
Wang scored China’s first goal in the 69th minute to even up the aggregate score at 3-3. Wang then picked up her second goal 14 minutes into the first extra period, putting China up 4-3 in the total score.
The second goal came after a South Korean turnover near their own box, with Wang capping off the Chinese rally with a well-struck shot to the bottom right corner.
There was little left in the South Korean tank to mount a rally over the final 15 or so minutes.
South Korea head coach Colin Bell said afterward his team couldn’t afford to let “a world class player” like Wang take over the match.
“She’s very dangerous. In extra time, she decided to work maybe a little bit harder than before,” Bell said. “If we are gifting that kind of player that opportunity, she’s not going to say no. That’s very disappointing and bitter for us after performing so well for 120 minutes.”
South Korea entered this match with 28 losses in 38 matches against China, while managing just four wins and six draws. They had five losses and one draw in their six most recent meetings while scoring just twice in that stretch.
South Korea matched that goal total Tuesday. And though few would have expected South Korea to even go up by two goals, let alone win the match, Bell said he’s been trying to instill more confidence in his players since taking over the program in the fall of 2019.
“I have a lot of respect for the Chinese team but honestly, I came into this fixture expecting my players to win,” Bell said. “And that’s where we just have to give them even more confidence. We have such talented players that are great girls, character-wise, and they work so hard in training. But they need to believe much more in themselves.”
And Bell came away pleased with the progress his players made in that regard.
“I think we saw glimpses of that this evening,” he said. “I am very positive about the future, if we can continue and work the way we’ve been working.”