West Asia newspaper points out the secret in the Korean team's free kick method

Australia 1-2 South Korea.

From the group stage until the third quarter-final match between Iran and Japan, the 2023 Asian Cup had 3 goals scored from direct free kicks. 2 of them belonged to the Korean team, the other was scored by the Tajikistan team. The two players who scored from the free kick for Korea were Lee Kang-in and Son Heung-min.

Son Heung-min's goal was scored on the evening of February 2, helping South Korea win 2-1 against Australia and qualify for the semi-finals.

Son Heung-min scored from a direct free kick.

Winwin, a newspaper specializing in providing information on West Asian football, considers this to be Korea's strength. In addition to the individual abilities of the players, the newspaper believes that the Korean team has applied its own methods to create more danger in direct free kicks.

Accordingly, in free kick situations, two Korean players will stand in the opponent's wall and block the shot to the far corner.

This method is also applied by many teams in the world, but the difference is that the player standing in the wall will move out of position to open up a shooting angle for his teammates, while the two Korean players standing in the wall have the task of making the opposing goalkeeper hesitate. The player taking the free kick will align to shoot into the near corner. If the ball goes accurately, the goalkeeper will have more difficulty blocking it because they have moved a beat slower.

" Two Korean players will kneel next to the opponent's barrier to camouflage something that is about to happen. But all of their shots are taken into the high and far corners compared to the position of the two players kneeling on the field. Some teams use players standing in the barrier and then moving to open up the shooting angle, but the Korean players do this just to camouflage and distract the opponent ," wrote Winwin.

South Korea continued to apply the same defensive stance in the match against Bahrain. Lee Kang-in shot the ball wide of the crossbar.

In addition, the author of the article gives more evidence of the effectiveness of this tactic. Because players like Son Heung-min or Lee Kang-in rarely score from direct free kicks.

" Before today's goal, Son Heung-min took 21 direct free kicks and scored only 1 goal. That was the match between Tottenham and Watford in the 2021/22 season. Meanwhile, Lee Kang-in took 20 direct free kicks and scored 1 goal when Valencia's youth team met Young Boys' youth team in the UEFA Youth Champions League ," the author stated.

Thanks to the brilliance of Son Heung-min, the Korean team won the right to enter the semi-finals. Their opponent is Jordan. This is a good opportunity for coach Jurgen Klinsmann and his team to enter the final, winning the championship after 64 years of waiting.

Van Hai

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