South Korea’s national football team will face China and Thailand in the second round of the Asian qualification for the 2026 FIFA World Cup. The draw for the regional qualifiers took place recently and placed South Korea, ranked 28th, alongside 80th-ranked China and 113th-ranked Thailand in Group C. The fourth team in the group will be determined by the winner of the first-round matchup between Singapore and Guam.
The qualifying campaign will kick off with the first Group C matches on November 16. The bottom 20 teams in the latest FIFA world rankings, out of the 46 Asian Football Confederation (AFC) member nations, will start their journey in the first round. The qualifying format involves ten pairings, with each team playing a home and an away match on October 12 and 17.
Following the first round, the ten winners will advance to the second round, joined by the remaining 26 teams based on their FIFA rankings. South Korea, as the fourth-highest ranked AFC team after Japan, Iran, and Australia, will now compete in the second round, where nine groups of four teams will participate. The matches will take place between November 2023 and June 2024 in a home-and-away round-robin format.
The group winners and runners-up from each of the nine groups will progress to the third round, which will consist of three groups of six teams. The top two teams from each group will secure direct qualification for the World Cup. The third- and fourth-placed teams will move on to the fourth round, divided into two groups of three. They will compete against each other once at a neutral site, and the winners of each group will secure their spot in the World Cup.
The runners-up from each fourth-round group will enter the fifth round, where they will face off in a home-and-away format across two legs. The winning team will represent Asia in the inter-confederation playoffs for a chance to secure the final World Cup ticket.
The 2026 World Cup, set to be co-hosted by the United States, Mexico, and Canada, will welcome 48 countries, an increase from the previous 32. Asia will now have 8.5 slots available, including eight direct slots and one inter-confederation playoff slot. South Korea, led by coach Jurgen Klinsmann, has participated in every World Cup since 1986 and aims to continue its streak by securing qualification in the upcoming rounds.
The draw for the first two rounds took place on July 27 in Kuala Lumpur, and now national teams from across Asia are preparing for the qualifying battles that lie ahead.
In summary, South Korea will face China and Thailand in the second round of the Asian World Cup qualifiers, with hopes of securing a spot in the 2026 FIFA World Cup to be held in the United States, Mexico, and Canada. The journey will feature multiple rounds, with group stages and playoffs determining the qualified teams. As one of Asia’s top-ranked teams, South Korea aims to build on its strong World Cup legacy and ensure its participation in yet another global tournament.
