Asian Cup 2015 - Three Day Review

The Asian Cup has hit Australia with the finest 16 teams of the Asian region embarking on a three week journey to find out who claims the crown.

 

The mechanics of the cup are 16 teams, 4 seeded groups, top two from each group qualify for quarter finals in a two sided draw and it’s a straight knock out from there on in. Games will be played in five cities, namely Brisbane, Newcastle, Sydney, Canberra and Melbourne, as the geographically knowledgeable amongst you will recognise the host cities are all loosely east coast based so beggar all involvement for the Tasmanians, Territorians, South and Western Australians but at least it keeps the travel down to a reasonable level for the teams involved.

 

Who are the teams involved?

Group A – Australia, Kuwait, South Korea, Oman.

Group B – Uzbekistan, Saudi Arabia, North Korea, China.

Group C – United Arab Emirates, Iran, Bahrain, Qatar.

Group D – Japan, Jordan, Palestine, Iraq.

 



If the bookies are to be believed we should be looking for the following teams in the quarter finals Australia v Saudi Arabia, South Korea v Uzbekistan, Iran v Iraq, UAE v Japan. So for all of you who enjoy a game with a bit of feeling it looks unlikely that North and South Korea will be facing each other, Pyongyang have presumably already claimed the title is theirs, but if Iran can top their group a match up with their neighbours Iraq could be on the cards.

 

The smart money will be on a Japan v Australia final at Stadium Australia, Sydney on the 31 Jan and certainly the organisers will be hoping that is the case with an eighty four thousand capacity Olympic stadium to fill. Recent history will favour Japan to claim the crown but the Socceroos will be hoping that home advantage can carry them through and despite their recent slide down the FIFA standings it would take a brave man to bet against them making at least the semi-final and very possibly the final. The host nation open the tournament against Kuwait on Friday evening in Melbourne and should win comfortably, probably their toughest test in the group stages will come from South Korea on the 17th Jan in Brisbane.

 

No fewer than eight of the competing teams are ranked higher than Australia in the FIFA standings so it is by no means a forgone conclusion that the Socceroos will progress but the public of this sports fixated country expect no less from them and will turn out in large numbers to will them on. Attendances at games not featuring the hosts will of course be a worry and the greatest fears surround the potential sales for games in the national capital Canberra. Of the five host cities this is the only one that is not the home to an A League team and the locals desire for football may be tested by games such as Bahrain v UAE which could be eerily quiet on the terraces. Extratime.ie will be bringing you regular reviews and previews to keep you abreast of all the developments down here.

 



Day 1 Review

Australia 4 – 1 Kuwait

 

Australia opened the tournament with a 4-1 victory over Kuwait but the scoreline doesn’t tell the whole story of the game. Australia started the game looking a little under prepared and nervous, their passing was as tentative as their tackling and Kuwait took the lead in the eighth minute when Aziz Mashaan skipped a right sided corner kick in to the near post area, the Australian defenders  Mile Jedinak & Aziz Behich both paid too much attention to Fahed Al Ebrahim and got sucked too close to the touch line to affect the path of the ball, it bounced up nicely off of the turf to present Ali Hussein Fadhel with a very acceptable near post diving header which he put past Matt Ryan in the Socceroo goal from six yards.

 

This only increased the tension both in the stands and on the pitch and the Kuwaitis grew in confidence as much as the home crowd voices shrank. The Socceroos were seeing plenty of ball but coming up against a Kuwaiti team with a lead to defend they looked short on ideas of how to get back on level terms. Their salvation came as it so often has in the form of Tim Cahill when he equalised in the thirty third minute.  Massimo Luongo collected Ivan Franjic’s throw in to somehow wriggle between three defenders on the right hand side of the box, he pulled back to around the penalty spot where Cahill wrapped his foot around the ball to shoot to the roof of the net.

 

The home team visibly grew after the equaliser and got their noses in front just a minute before half time. Franjic threw in a cross from the right to where an unmarked Luongo rose to direct a slightly looping header over Hameed Youssef in the Kuwait goal.

 

As the second half kicked in rain began to fall in greater strength and the weather seemed to suit the Aussies all the better, their domination in both territory and possession grew and the pressure game favoured by their coach Ange Postecoglou came more readily too them. Matthew Leckie rattled the cross bar and Youssef denied Cahill a second before Robbie Kruse earned a penalty successfully despatched by skipper Jedinak in the sixty second minute.

 

Kuwait shook themselves into action and regained a foothold in the game as their second half substitutes began to join forces, Ryan managed to get the smallest of deflections to an effort from Fahad El Ebrahim to tip it on to the bar and keep the Australian lead intact. A league hot shot Nathan Burns was called from the bench and produced a fine block from Youssef as well as also striking the bar with a well-directed header before the Socceroos finally applied the coup de grace with a goal from James Troisi who capitalised on persistent work from Leckie to fire home at the near post.

 

So all is good in the Aussie footballing world and they will look forward to facing up to Oman on Tuesday in Sydney.

 

Day 2 Review

South Korea 1 – 0 Oman

Uzbekistan 1 – 0 North Korea

China 1 – 0 Saudi Arabia

 

After last night’s opening game in Melbourne the tournament really kicked into gear today with three games being played. First up we had the second game from Group A, South Korea versus Oman in Canberra with the Korean team getting a 1-0 win. Over the ninety minutes South Korea probably deserved the win but Oman can look back on a decent first half where they did their best work.

 

South Korea hit the bar with their first chance in the seventh minute when the poster boy of their team Heung-Min Son worked a little space at an acute angle in the inside left channel, his lobbed effort bounced off the top of the woodwork and away to safety. A free header for Jaber Al Owaisi from a right sided Oman corner was wasted over the top of the goal on twelve minutes. Then Oman were denied what looked like a decent penalty shout in the sixteenth minute when Qasim Said went down under the challenge of Joo-Young Kim but the ref waved play on. In the twenty first minute the Oman boys got behind the Korean back line down the outside right channel after good work by right back Raed Ibrahim Saleh the pull back to the penalty spot by Qasim found no supporting players at all when it was begging to be rolled home. In the fortieth minute Eid Mohammed curled a free kick just around the angle of post and bar.

 

South Korean still had time to launch a series of attacks at the end of the first half, a long throw in the forty fourth minute glanced off the head of Oman defender Abdul Sallam Amur and forced keeper Ali Al Habsi to claw the ball away at full stretch. A minute later Heung Min Son forced Al Habsi to beat away an effort from around thirty yards but he could not prevent the goal a minute later. A run through the middle by Chung-Yong Lee allowed the space for Ja-Cheol Koo to drive in an effort from twenty yards, although Al Habsi saved he pushed the ball into the path of South Korean striker Young-Cheo Cho who shot back past him into the corner.

 

South Korea went on to dominate the second half and presentable chances came and went for Chung-Yong Lee and Ja-Cheol Koo the latter bringing a fine reflex save from Al Habsi from a six yard header. Oman gathered themselves for one last effort and came within a whisker of getting a leveller in the second minute of added time. A right wing corner was met by the head of Amad Al Hosni the Korean keeper Jin-Hyeon Kim tipped the ball on to the bar and it was cleared.

 

So South Korea go level on points with Australia at the top of the group and you would have to think that the game between the two nations on the seventeenth will decide the group winner.

 

Group B got under way when North Korea faced up to Uzbekistan in Sydney, Uzbekistan had the upper hand throughout and came away with a 1-0 win. Uzbekistan struck the base of the Korean post in the seventeenth minute when a right wing cross by Sanjar Tursonov found Timur Kapadze at the far post but his header struck wood and bounced into the keepers’ hands. The half progressed as basically a game of attack and defend with the North Koreans very happy to sit back and try to counter their opponents on the break.

 

The stalemate was broken seventeen minutes into the second half when Server Djeparov crossed from the left to find Igor Sergeev twelve yards out who headed home to the bottom left hand corner. North Korea came close to getting an undeserved equaliser in the fourth minute of added time when a corner from the right hand side was headed by Pak Kwang-ryong only to see the Uzbek keeper Ignaty Nesterov pull off an amazing reflex save to push the ball up into the air and see it cleared away.

 

We continued our journey north to see China take on Saudi Arabia in Brisbane in front of very healthy support for the team in red. It was a game of very few chances and we had to wait until the forty third minute for the first real chance. It fell to Wu Xi as he drove straight through the middle of the park and shot for the bottom left corner from the edge of the box, with the fingertips of Saudi keeper Waleed Abdullah involved the ball skidded just past the post. The Saudis had a gilt edged chance to open the scoring when Naif Hazazi was chopped down by Ren Hang, however his tamely hit penalty was easily saved by Waleed Abdullah. The Saudis were made to rue that missed chance in the eighty first minute when China scored the winner. Yu Hai drilled in a thirty yard free kick which deflected off of the end of the two man wall and wrong footed the keeper to nestle in the bottom corner.

 

Day 3 Review

UAE 4 – 1 Qatar

Iran 2 – 0 Bahrain

 

Canberra hosted its second game when United Arab Emirates took on their neighbours the highly rated Qatar, UAE claimed the honours with a 4-1 victory. The first effort of the game was generated by UAE when the extravagantly coiffured Omar Abdulrahman curled a free kick from the right hand side on to the goal but the Qatari keeper Qasem Burhan clawed it away.

 

Qatar took the lead in the twenty third minute when Mohammed Abdullah Tresor  got on the end of a long straight ball which split the UAE defence from Hasan Al Haydos his effort was blocked by Qasem but fell to the feet of Khalfan Ibrahim who adjusted quickly to lob/volley home from the edge of the box. A little fortuitously UAE levelled in the thirty seventh minute some absolutely terrible defending by keeper and defenders gave Khaled Abdulraaqf Al Zrigi a chance to cross from the inside right channel to the far post, Ahmed Khalil had header was cleared off of the line by Majed but rebounded straight back to Khalil who chested home.

 

UAE edged ahead in the fifty second minute, Ahmed Khalil lined up a right footed free kick from the left hand corner of the box and it somehow evaded everyone to find the far corner. It became 3-1 just four minutes later again a free kick was the undoing of the Qataris, Khamis Esmaeel fired in a thirty yard effort which Qasem spilled, Ali Ahmed Mabkhout reacted quickest to tap home.

 

In fairness to Qatar they kept going and created chances for Mohammed Abdulrahman and Mohammed Abdullah Tresor  before UAE sickened them with an eighty ninth minute goal to settle the game 4-1. Omar Abdulrahman took his hair bear bunch haircut for a run through the middle of the park swapping passes with Ali Ahmed Mabkhout before teeing up Mabkhout just six yards out to finish at the near post.

 

Attention then switched to Melbourne where one of the tournament favourites Iran faced up to Bahrain, Iran justified their favourites tag with a 2-0 win but Bahrain more than played their part in a wonderful match. Bahrain should have taken the lead in the eighth minute when a left sided set piece delivery from Faouzi Aaish glanced off the head of Iranian Masoud Shojaei to reach Jaycee John at the far post who pulled his volley over the angle of post and bar.

 

Bahrain threatened again two minutes later through a header by Sayed Dhiya but again it was put over the top. Iran had two goals disallowed in the twenty second and thirty first minutes to debatable offside decisions but did manage to get their noses ahead in the second minute of added time at the end of the first half. A right side corner from Andranik Teymourian was glanced away to the edge of the box by a combination of Jaycee John and keeper Sayed Mohammed Jaffar to the waiting Ehsan Hajsafi who sliced his volley but found the perfect connection to find the top corner.

 

Thriteen minutes into the second half Jaycee John again put Iranian keeper Alireza Haghighi to work when his shot from the left hand side of the box had to be turned away. The frenetic pace of the game barely died down at all as the teams put on a great show for a crowd predominantly made up of Iranian fans. Iran took a 2-0 lead in the seventy first minute with Teymourian again getting the assist, his delivery landed around the penalty spot where Masoud Shojaei made an awful connection with his volley but it had enough strength and direction to find the bottom corner. The game continued to swing from end to end as the players gave their all but the scoreline stayed the same to leave Bahrain gallant losers.