{"id":514204,"date":"2026-03-02T16:39:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-02T16:39:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/514204\/"},"modified":"2026-03-02T16:39:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-02T16:39:08","slug":"iran-beaten-in-opening-game-of-womens-afc-asian-cup-as-tensions-escalate-back-home","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/514204\/","title":{"rendered":"Iran beaten in opening game of Women&#8217;s AFC Asian Cup as tensions escalate back home"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph__iYReA\">Iran have been soundly beaten in the opening match of the Women&#8217;s AFC Asian Cup campaign, losing 3-0 to South Korea on the Gold Coast.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph__iYReA\">Playing despite heightened tensions back home after the United States and Israeli air strikes at the weekend, the Iranians put in a solid defensive effort in the first half before conceding two goals after half-time.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.abc.net.au\/news\/2026-03-02\/womens-asian-cup-football-matildas-philippines-quick-hits\/106393338\" data-component=\"FullBleedLink\" class=\"RelatedCard_link__rsgR9 FullBleedLink_root__lTw_U interactive_focusContext__yRhc_ interactive_defaults__AKxUU FullBleedLink_showVisited__g3Xvz\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Matildas vs Philippines quick hits<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"Typography_base__sj2RP RelatedCard_synopsis__cFwMW Typography_sizeMobile14__u7TGe Typography_lineHeightMobile20___U7Vr Typography_regular__WeIG6 Typography_colourInherit__dfnUx\" data-component=\"Typography\">Sam Kerr makes the difference, Mary Fowler has a class cameo and Chloe Lincoln is cool in an injury crisis. Here are the quick hits from the Matildas&#8217; Asian Cup opener against the Philippines.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph__iYReA\">The Iranians are in the same group as Australia and will face the host nation at the same venue on Thursday in Matchday 2.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph__iYReA\">South Korea dominated possession in the opening half but were unable to take their early opportunities.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph__iYReA\">But the 2022 runners-up took advantage when Iran were a player down temporarily following an injury to Afsaneh Chatrenoor.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph__iYReA\">Choe Yu-ri latched onto a rebound off the post to fire the ball into the net after 37 minutes.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph__iYReA\">The Koreans ramped up the pressure in the second half.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph__iYReA\">Kim Hye-ri slotted home a penalty shortly before the hour mark following a foul on Lee Eun-young.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.abc.net.au\/news\/2026-03-02\/iran-pessimistic-about-fifa-world-cup-after-us-air-strikes\/106404046\" data-component=\"FullBleedLink\" class=\"RelatedCard_link__rsgR9 FullBleedLink_root__lTw_U interactive_focusContext__yRhc_ interactive_defaults__AKxUU FullBleedLink_showVisited__g3Xvz\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Iran pessimistic about FIFA World Cup after US air strikes<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"Typography_base__sj2RP RelatedCard_synopsis__cFwMW Typography_sizeMobile14__u7TGe Typography_lineHeightMobile20___U7Vr Typography_regular__WeIG6 Typography_colourInherit__dfnUx\" data-component=\"Typography\">Reverberations from the Middle East conflict hits global sport, with Iran&#8217;s soccer chief offering a bleak outlook for the FIFA World Cup in the United States.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph__iYReA\">And then 15 minutes from time, Ko Yoo-jin headed in their third of the night after 75 minutes to complete the win.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph__iYReA\">The win for the Koreans was expected. Their FIFA world ranking is 21 while the Iranians are at 68th, with a top ranking of 48.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph__iYReA\">South Korea lost the 2022 final to China 3-2, giving the Chinese their record-extending ninth title.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph__iYReA\">The win puts South Korea on top of the Group A table on goal difference, ahead of the Matildas who beat Philippines 1-0 in their opening match on Sunday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph_paragraph__iYReA\">Reuters\/ABC<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Iran have been soundly beaten in the opening match of the Women&#8217;s AFC Asian Cup campaign, losing 3-0&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":514205,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[41432,64,63,2485,5575,50896,44964,70956,13198,5813,85],"class_list":["post-514204","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-asian-cup","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-gold-coast","tag-iran","tag-iranians","tag-matildas","tag-robina","tag-soccer","tag-south-korea","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/514204","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=514204"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/514204\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/514205"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=514204"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=514204"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=514204"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}