The match between South Korea and Belgium concludes the run of the last Asian team in the World Cup. Belgium won over South Korea over a 1-0 final score securing their spot at the top 16 going through the knockouts. Other Teams representing the continent are Iran, Japan and Australia.
An accumulated result showed that the teams had played 12 games all in all, having three draws, 9 losses with no wins at all. This is most heart breaking for the South Korean team having been able to join the world cup nine times already; the most number of appearances compared to other Asian teams.
Their performances have deteriorated through the years. Both Jana and South Korea was able to go through the second rounds during the 2002 World Cup. They were also the host World Cup during that year. They had also moved on to the knockouts during the 2010 FIFA World Cup. Besides that, Australia was able to move pass the qualifiers during the year 2006.
When South Korea coach Hong Myung-bo was asked about this he said Asian football is at a transition period adding "'I think that each team played in different styles but overall there were a lot of deficiencies in the Asian teams. We weren't up to the standard ... we weren't good enough."
What could be the reason for the slow progression of the Asian Team in football? Some analyst thinks that it is the lack of high level completion within the league that is causing their weak performance.
Sunderland midfielder Ki Sung-yeung thinks that the Asian football team still has a long way to go before they can keep up with the Europeans and South Americans. He said "'We need to try more to be a better team and we have to be realistic. We are not better than the Europeans or South America or whatever. We need to improve ourselves more and this shows that we are not better than them."
Good thing is that the Asian team is well supprtted by the Asian Football Confederation President Shaikh Salman bin Ebrahim Al Khalifa. He said that Asian team still has a lot of things to work on yet they have a lot of potential being younger which would have to mean that "they can only get better."
