For the first time in history, Asian football has up to 9 representatives participating in the 2026 World Cup (including Australia playing in the Asian qualifiers). South Korea, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Australia, Japan... even had a fairly impressive start at the world tournament with a series of wins and draws against higher-rated representatives. That is a positive sign for a continent ambitious to narrow down its class with South American or "Old Continent" football. However, as veteran coach Philippe Troussier warned, the opening round of the World Cup cannot say much, especially when European or South American teams usually only get into gear from the 2nd round. Indeed, the limited capacity of many Asian teams begins to emerge. Qatar lost 0-6 to Canada, or another representative, Iraq, lost 5-0 when facing Senegal.
The most disappointing must be South Korea and Uzbekistan. With Uzbekistan, the Central Asian representative brought to the 2026 World Cup a golden generation invested methodically. After a decade of making a big splash in a series of continental youth tournaments, this national team came to North America with a lot of optimism. However, the gap between youth football and top football is too vast. Position in Asia cannot be synonymous with resilience at the World Cup. Inexperience caused Uzbekistan to continuously collapse in matches against Colombia, Portugal and the DRC Congo. Khusanov - Uzbekistan's best center-back also became a "paper tiger" against attacks far superior in level.
South Korea's defeat is also a shock. But looking back over the past year, coach Hong Myung-bo's team's farewell to the 2026 World Cup right from the group stage is not surprising. The force transfer process is too slow, the force is "misunderstood" as commensurate with the European level. Remember, Son Heung-min was on the other side of the peak of his career. Meanwhile, the successors have not yet reached a high level and most do not play for top world clubs.
Before the tournament, the South Korean team was also involved in controversies related to conflicts with the country's media. This also had some negative impacts on the morale of Son Heung-min and his teammates.
In the picture exposing the ability and level gap of the majority of Asian teams compared to the World Cup, Japan is a name worthy of expecting to make a difference. True to the confident statement that they will conquer the world's peak before the tournament takes place, coach Hajime Moriyasu and his team had a convincing performance and results in the group stage. Even when facing Brazil in the 1/16 round, the Japanese still show optimism about a scenario that can play fairly and create positive results.
