Son Heung-Min’s South Korea almost escaped an Asian Cup shock on Saturday, drawing 2-2 with Jordan thanks to an injury-time own goal.
Jordan seemed to be on track for a spectacular triumph in Doha one day after Iraq defeated tournament favourites Japan, thanks to a Park Yong-woo own goal and a Yazan Al-Naimat score in the first half that cancelled out Son’s ninth-minute penalty.
However, Yazan Al-Arab deflected the ball into his own net in the first minute of injury time at the conclusion of the game, allowing Jurgen Klinsmann’s Koreans to finish with a point in Group E.
A victory for either club would have advanced them to the knockout stages with one game to spare.
Klinsmann’s team defeated Bahrain 3-1 in their first encounter and will play Malaysia in their final group game on Thursday. Qualification for the last 16 is still within their grasp.
As it is with Jordan, who defeated Malaysia 4-0 and will meet Bahrain on the same day.
Klinsmann was obliged to make one change from the first game, substituting goalkeeper Jo Hyeon-woo for Kim Seung-gyu.
Kim sustained a ruptured anterior cruciate ligament in his right knee during a training session and is sidelined for the remainder of the competition.
The Koreans also had five players on yellow cards after their encounter against Bahrain.
Son calmed their worries with the first goal after being granted a penalty after a VAR review.
Ehsan Haddad was found to have taken down Son, and the Korean captain converted the penalty kick himself with a clever chip.
He rejoiced by holding up a custodian shirt with Kim’s name.
Son came close to scoring again halfway through the first half, but the Jordan defenders made a key late stop.
Until then, the Koreans had been nearly completely dominant, but Jordan began to threaten and equalised in the 37th minute.
South Korea failed to cope with a corner kick, and Park bundled the ball into his own goal under pressure from Arab at the back post.
Naimat then gave Jordan an unexpected lead in the sixth minute of first-half injury time, blasting a shot into the bottom corner from the outside of the box.
South Korea failed to respond in the second half, and Cho Gue-sung had a dreadful miss when he blasted over the crossbar on the hour mark.
The Koreans didn’t appear like scoring until one minute into injury time, when Hwang In-beom sent a shot that Arab diverted into his own net.