“We are fortunate that the game was not decided by more than three goals.”

South Korea’s Asian Games football team, led by Hwang Sun-hong (55), won 2-0 against China in the quarterfinals of the Hangzhou 2022 Asian Games at the Huanglong Sports Center Stadium in Hangzhou, China, at 9 p.m. ET on Monday.

The Koreans will face Uzbekistan, 홀덤사이트 who defeated Saudi Arabia 2-1 in the quarterfinals earlier in the day, in the semifinals.

In a game that was expected to be a rough and tumble affair in front of a one-sided crowd of 50,000, the difference in quality between Korea and China was stark.

Early on, China tried to stifle Kisun with harsh fouls, but the momentum shifted to South Korea in the first 20 minutes when Hong Hyun-seok’s picturesque left-footed free kick was converted into a goal. Immediately after the goal, Hong Hyun-seok put his index finger to his lips and performed a “shhh” gesture to the crowd.

It wasn’t over yet. Song Min-gyu, who started the game, added his team’s second goal in the 35th minute to seal the victory for South Korea. South Korea remained focused in the second half and held off China to advance to the quarterfinals.

After the game, criticism from Chinese soccer journalists poured in.

According to Chinese media outlet Sohu, soccer journalist Mothersing called the result “more than normal” and said, “It’s especially positive that we didn’t concede more goals in the second half.” He said that China deserved to lose and that they were lucky to only concede two goals.

“China’s generation of 1999-born players is far superior to Korea’s,” he said. It shouldn’t be overlooked that Korea’s U-20 team was runner-up at the 2019 U-20 World Cup and Lee Kang-in was the MVP of the tournament,” he said, noting the difference in quality between Chinese and Korean soccer.

“China is not even in the top eight in Asia at the age group level. A two-point loss to South Korea is a good enough result. We are lucky that we didn’t lose by more than three goals,” he said, emphasizing that “we don’t like it, but we have to accept the reality.”