South Korea’s national soccer team bounced back from an early concession to tie the first half of the Asian Games final.

Hwang Sun-hong’s U-24 team is playing Japan in the Hangzhou AG 2022 Men’s Football Final at the Huanglong Sports Center Stadium in Hangzhou, China, on Sunday at 9 p.m. ET. With a third consecutive title at stake, the match ended in a 1-1 tie at halftime.

South Korea had been on a “record-breaking” run leading up to the final. They dominated the tournament, scoring 25 goals and conceding just two in six games.

However, the final against Japan got off to a rocky start. Just 1 minute and 20 seconds into the game, Japan conceded the first goal. Despite Hwang Sun-hongho’s strong pressing, Japan’s ability to break away from the defense was the first to shine. Sato Gain attacked the Korean right flank. In a flank battle, Hwang Jae-won was unable to stop him, and Sato sent a cross into the box.

Kotaro Uchino, who had scored three goals in the tournament, took the rebound and rattled the net. It was Uchino’s fourth goal of the tournament. He took advantage of the space left by the Korean defense and scored in a flash. It came just one minute and 20 seconds into the match.레고토토

At the crunch time, it was Jung Woo-young, who had been booked earlier in the day, who stepped up for AG. In the 26th minute of the first half, Jung tied the game with a neat header off a cross from Hwang Jae-won. It was Jung’s eighth goal of the tournament. An early cross from Hwang Jae-won was ‘delivered’ to the head of Jung Woo-young, who was waiting on the sideline, and he immediately followed up with a clean header. Jung had already registered a hat-trick against Kuwait in the first round of the group stage, as well as multi-goal performances against Kyrgyzstan in the round of 16 and Uzbekistan in the quarterfinals.

Meanwhile, Hwang Sun-hongho started Hwang Jae-won, Park Jin-seop, Lee Han-beom, Park Kyu-hyun, Jeong Ho-yeon, Baek Seung-ho, Jeong Woo-young, Lee Young-joon, Lee Kang-in and Cho Young-wook. The goalkeeping gloves were worn by Lee Kwang-yeon, who is regarded as the best second-line resource in the country, and he pressured Japan all the time. With their best lineup, excluding Hong Hyun-seok and Uhm Won-sang, they succeeded in closing out the first half without giving up any momentum.