3-1，1-1！ The World Preliminary Tournament is chaotic: Asia's 17th upset, or 8 points to squeeze out the national football team and advance to the top 18

Chat about the ball in the middle of the mountain

2024-05-13 05:46Published in Fujian

The 2026 World Cup will be reformed, expanded for the first time, and jointly hosted by three countries for the first time. One of the aims of FIFA's reforms is to maximize the benefits of the tournament by hoping that the world's most populous Chinese team will eventually qualify for the World Cup finals. The number of qualifying places in Asia has been increased from 4.5 to 8.5. In addition to Japan, South Korea, Saudi Arabia, Australia, Iran, Qatar, Iraq, and the United Arab Emirates all have the opportunity to qualify, and the national football team has started its second journey to the World Cup finals.

In recent years, Chinese football has failed to qualify for the World Series for 16 consecutive years due to internal friction, resulting in the collapse of the youth training system of Chinese football, and the Chinese youth team has not been able to qualify for the U23 Asian Cup that has just ended, and therefore failed to participate in the Paris Olympics. The current Chinese men's football team has reached the point where all teams in Asia want to touch China, and third-rate teams such as Thailand are also eager to snatch the qualification for the round of 18 from the national football team.

Thai football has improved rapidly in recent years, and in the Asian Cup at the beginning of the year, Thailand drew with Oman and Saudi Arabia, and advanced to the knockout stage with zero goals conceded in the group stage. In the 1/8 finals, he fought with Uzbekistan and lost only 1-2. In the U23 Asian Cup, Thailand's Olympic team defeated the eventual runner-up Iraq 2-0, impressing fans.

In the round of 36 of the World Preliminaries, the Thai team and the Chinese team, the South Korean team and the Singapore team were in Group C. However, in the second round, Thailand defeated Singapore 3-1 to achieve its first victory in this World Preliminary Tournament.

Thailand played the strongest team in the group in the third and fourth rounds of back-to-back legs home and away, South Korea, and Thailand first drew 1-1 away from South Korea to grab a life-saving point. Back at home, South Korea broke out, beating Thailand with a score of 3-0, and after four rounds, Thailand is in third place in Group C with 4 points, 3 points behind the second-ranked Chinese team, and there is still hope of qualifying.

For Thailand, the last two rounds are against China and Singapore, and if they can grab four points in these two rounds, then the possibility of advancing is very high. According to the rules, in the case of a tie in points, the goal difference is compared first. Thailand is desperate to grab points against China in the fifth round. Past head-to-head history shows that Thailand have beaten China on two occasions on the road, with the scores being 2-1 and 5-1 respectively.

Due to the decline in the level of the Chinese team, the Thai team sees the hope of overtaking the Chinese team. As long as one point is grabbed in the battle between China and Thailand, then the initiative to advance will be in the hands of Thailand. It is precisely because the Thai team sees such hope that they have the idea of challenging China. If the Thai team can draw with the Chinese team, then after five rounds, the Chinese team has 8 points and the Thai team has 5 points. In the final round, China will face South Korea, and Thailand will face Singapore.

The Chinese team faced the South Korean team in the last round, it is very difficult to grab points, the Thai team has no problem with defeating Singapore, and will brush up on goal difference, so that at the end of the final round, the standings of Group C may be, the Chinese team and the Thai team have 8 points, and the Thai team squeezed out the Chinese team with the advantage of goal difference and advanced to the round of 18. At that time, Chinese football will fall to an all-time low.

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