ACL Two: Kuching City's Still Awaits First Win
Choe Byeong-chan's first-half strike gives the K League 1 side their first win of the campaign and leaves The Cats bottom of Group H with one point from three matches.
Kuching City FC (KCFC) are still waiting for their first win in the AFC Champions League Two (ACL2) after a narrow 1-0 defeat to Gangwon FC. The third Group H match was played at the Gangneung Stadium, Gangnueng.
Aidil Sharin Sahak's side now have just one point from their first three matches, after a 2-1 defeat to Phnom Penh Crown and a 1-1 home draw with Kitchee. Gangwon will be relieved to get off the mark finally. They dropped into ACL2 after a 1-0 defeat to Gamba Osaka in the AFC Champions League Elite play-off, then drew 0-0 with Kitchee and lost 2-1 at home to Phnom Penh Crown. The win takes them to four points from three matches.
The visitors had to absorb early pressure as the hosts came out aggressively, with Lee Seung-won and Kim Gun-hee leading wave after wave of attacks down the flanks. KCFC nearly paid the price in the seventh minute. They lost the ball in midfield, and Gangwon broke quickly, but James Okwuosa blocked Kim Dae-won's effort from inside the box.
Gangwon kept pushing. In the 12th minute, Haziq Nadzli parried a fierce strike from Kim. The ball spun behind him, but Ariff Farhan Md Isa got to it in time to keep it out, and Haziq gathered.
The breakthrough came in the 27th minute. Choe Byeong-chan controlled a pass from Kang Jun-hyuk and fired past Haziq from outside the box to put the hosts 1-0 up.
KCFC tried to hit back straight away. A minute later, Ramadhan Saifullah had their first attempt of the match but sent it wide. In the 32nd minute, Dylan Wenzel-Halls fired a wild effort high over the bar. Okwuosa then went close with a header in a goalmouth scramble after a corner in the 38th minute.
After the break, KCFC stepped up the pressure in search of an equaliser. However, they couldn't seriously trouble Park Cheong-hyo in the Gangwon goal, with South Korea international Shin Min-ha marshalling a solid defence. A promising move in the 79th minute came to nothing when Ramadhan fired wide of the right post.
The 1-0 scoreline held until the final whistle, giving Gangwon their first three points of this season's ACL2 campaign on home soil.
Credit Photo : KCFC
