Why South Korea subbed off Son Heung-min in 1-1 tie game with 20 minutes to play
· Yahoo Sports
Why South Korea subbed off Son Heung-min in 1-1 tie game with 20 minutes to play originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
The move snuck up a bit on those watching South Korea take on Czechia to open the 2026 FIFA World Cup tournament for those two nations.
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With about 23 minutes to play in regular time, South Korea subbed off Son Heung-min. The captain and star striker walked off the pitch.
The match was tied 1-1 at the time, which made it seem an odd time to take Sonny out of the match.
It probably made sense in the bigger picture, though.
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Why did South Korea sub off Son?
South Korea likely had this planned all along.
In the opening game of the tournament, in the heat, humidity and altitude that the match was being played at, the Koreans likely didn't want to overdo it with their captain.
Son is 33 now, still at peak fitness, but he also was sprinting all over the pitch during his shift on Thursday night.
The Koreans played the ball over the top to him often, and Son never takes a play off.
He likely wasn't happy to be coming off for multiple reasons, including because he had a couple chances in which he could've come closer to scoring than he did.
But in the end, South Korea is focused on this tournament as a whole, and so that meant they didn't push Son too far in the opener, even though it was tied.
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