Up towards one of many pre-tournament favourites, Jordan reached the ultimate of the Asian Cup for the primary time after beautiful South Korea 2-0.
Yazan Al Naimat and Mousa Tamari struck within the second half at Ahmad Bin Ali Stadium in Al-Rayyan, Qatar, to upset the chances and finish coach Jurgen Klinsmann’s hopes of including one other main trophy to his assortment.
Jordan will play Iran or defending champion Qatar within the remaining this weekend. Their semifinal is on Wednesday.
South Korea, in the meantime, had been left to rue a missed alternative as their await a 3rd Asian Cup title goes on.
Al Naimat fired Jordan forward within the 53rd minute by flicking a shot past goalkeeper Jo Hyeon-woo, who had already pulled off a collection of saves to maintain the rating degree.
Tamari made it 2-0 within the 66th with a long-range effort, which made followers within the stadium go wild, and lengthen his staff’s unlikely run within the competitors.
Jordan had solely superior to the spherical of 16 as top-of-the-line third-place groups within the group stage and had completed under South Korea in Group E.
However underneath Moroccan coach Ammouta, they saved arising with the best solutions and dominated the semifinal.
Klinsmann admitted Jordan gained virtually each one-on-one battle within the first half hour.
South Korea wanted a stoppage-time personal purpose to safe a draw with Jordan within the group stage and mounted late comebacks within the spherical of 16 and quarterfinals towards Saudi Arabia and Australia, respectively. However a repeat by no means regarded probably on this event.
Whereas the two-time champions had been aiming to win their first Asian Cup since 1960, Jordan had been taking part in within the semifinal for the primary time.
However South Korea’s gamers regarded inhibited as Jordan utilized the stress.
Noor Al Rawabdeh and Al Naimat each pressured saves from Jo within the early levels and Tamari fired narrowly large with one other effort.
South Korea struggled to create openings however got here near going forward simply after the half-hour mark. Lee Jae-sung stooped to fulfill Hwang In-beom’s cross from the best, however his header got here again off the foot of the put up.
Jordan then had their greatest likelihood of the half shortly earlier than the break when Al Naimat twisted and turned his means by means of the realm and stabbed a shot at purpose from 5 metres (yards) out. He was solely denied by the face of Jo, who appeared to know little about his save.
With the keeper dazed and making an attempt to gather himself, he then repelled the rebound from Al Rawabdeh along with his heals whereas going through the fallacious course.
Jordan emerged after halftime with renewed risk and took the lead eight minutes after the restart.
A free move from Park Yong-woo was seized upon by Tamari and he fed Al Naimat.
The ahead wasn’t to be denied on this event and he flicked a shot over the advancing Jo to spark wild celebrations within the crowd of 42,850.
The cheers had been even louder when Jordan doubled the lead 13 minutes later by means of a superb solo purpose from Tamari.
Operating from deep in South Korea’s half, he carried the ball to the sting of the field earlier than curling a low shot into the underside nook.