Football / World Cup USA '94: Seo puts the heat on Spain

Spain. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .2

Salinas 51, Goicoechea 56

South Korea. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .2

Hong Myung Bo 84, Seo Jung Won 90

Attendance: 56,247

SOUTH KOREA caused the first surprise of the 1994 World Cup late on Friday, snatching a 2-2 draw against Spain with a little help from a red card and the sapping heat in Dallas.

The Spanish were reduced to 10 men after only 25 minutes when their captain and sweeper, Miguel Angel Nadal, chased a through ball with Ko Jeong Woon and was adjudged to have fouled the South Korean on the edge of the area. Having given the free-kick, the referee, Peter Mikkelsen of Denmark, had little choice but to send Nadal off for denying the Korean a goalscoring opportunity.

But after holding out to the interval and then going two goals ahead early in the second half, Spain shrivelled in the heat. The South Korea coach, Kim Ho, sent on the winger, Seo Jung Won, on the hour and he proved too lively for a tiring Spain defence. Twice he waltzed past the full-back, Sergi, into the area but, having got to dangerous byline positions, wasted them with fruitless near-post efforts. He finally came good with a last-minute equaliser, beating Spain's offside trap from Hong Myung Bo's pass and calmly side- footing home. Hong had brought them back into the game when his free-kick took a cruel deflection which wrongfooted Spain's goalkeeper, Jose Luis Canizares.

'I sent on Seo because he is very fast and I saw the Spaniards were getting very tired,' Kim said. 'Even with only six minutes left, I knew we could still do it because they were visibly wilting.'

The Spanish coach, Javier Clemente, also pointed to the debilitating effects of being a man short for 65 minutes in 30C temperatures. 'Playing with 10 men is very tough,' he said. 'At the end we were tremendously tired. We couldn't keep the Koreans out.'

After Nadal's early expulsion, South Korea came close to taking the lead, Canizares saving brilliantly from Hong's free-kick. Canizares did even better to smother Hong's eight-yard effort 10 minutes later.

However, Spain snatched back the initiative with a second-half switch that saw the Atletico Madrid midfielder, Jose Luis Caminero, replace Julen Guerrero. His perfect pass allowed Juan Goicoechea to send a cross to Julio Salinas for the first and his lob, after two blocked shots, set up Goicoechea for the headed second goal.