The 8th round of the Asian Zone Round of 12 will be fully played on the first day of the Chinese New Year, and this round will produce up to 2 teams that advance to the World Cup, namely Saudi Arabia and South Korea. Saudi Arabia played a few hours earlier than South Korea, so Saudi Arabia is about to become the second-placed team in Asia, which is much stronger than the national football team, and the difference in points between the two teams is 14 points.
At present, there are teams in the top 12 to advance to the World Cup, ranking first in Asia, Iran, after defeating Iraq in the last round, the points reached 19 points, leaving only 3 rounds to lead the third group of the United Arab Emirates team by 10 points, locking the top two in the group in advance, smoothly passing through the World Cup, and participating for the 6th time in team history.
Originally, the South Korean team could join hands with the Iranian team to pass the World Cup three rounds in advance at the same time, but the UAE team won, so that the South Korean team's promotion was suspended.
Now saudi arabia has a chance to qualify for the World Cup a few hours ahead of South Korea, and the away match against Japan will be played at 18:10 this afternoon, and South Korea's match against Syria is tonight's kick-off at 22:00.
As a traditional Asian powerhouse, Saudi Arabia has participated in the World Cup finals for 5 times, and the team in the top 12 has played well, after the first round of 3-1 reverse vietnam, to the latest round of 1-0 small victory over Oman, Hao won 6 wins and 1 draw, equaling the points record of the first 7 games of the final stage of the World Preliminary Tournament in Asia held by the Chinese men's football team.
Now in the latest Group B standings, Saudi Arabia has accumulated 19 points, ranking first, 4 points ahead of the second-ranked Japanese team, and 5 points ahead of the third-ranked Australian team, and the situation of qualifying for the World Cup is very good.
As long as the Japanese team is defeated, the Saudi team has 22 points, leaving the Japanese team with 7 points, leaving only 2 rounds of the group stage, you can lock in the top two of the group in advance, successfully pass the World Cup, and become the team in the second line of the round of 12.
Before the start of the round of 12, the Saudi team was not optimistic, at most it won the third place in the group, and now it is close to locking the top two in the group, and the performance is far stronger than the national football team. The national football team won 1 win, 2 draws and 4 losses in 7 rounds, only accumulated 5 points to rank fifth in the group, did not have the opportunity to pass the World Cup in the early three rounds, and had little hope of competing for the third place in the group, and was eliminated in the 8th round at the earliest.
If the Saudi team wins against japan, it will not have the opportunity to pass through the World Cup, and it will need to compete in the next round of away matches against the national football team to strive for promotion, and the national football team will become the judge at this time.