SEOUL, South Korea (Yonhap) By Kim Dong-chan = The South Korean women’s soccer team suffered its second straight group stage defeat at the FIFA Women’s World Cup Australia-New Zealand 2023.South Korea, coached by Colleen Bell (England), lost 0-1 to Morocco in their second Group H match on Tuesday in Adelaide, Australia. The Moroccans were making their first appearance at the Women’s World Cup and were ranked 72nd in the FIFA rankings, well below Korea’s 17th-ranked team. Prior to kickoff, South Korea had naturally picked Morocco as the “one to beat,” but they were unable to recover from a goal in the sixth minute of the first half and fell to their knees. In fact, before the tournament, Korea had vague expectations of making it to the round of 16, let alone the quarterfinals. Prior to the tournament, the Korea Football Association’s monthly technical report Onside surveyed 31 players who participated in the final call-up training for the World Cup, and 16, or 51.6 percent, said they expected to finish in the top eight. Twelve (38.7%) also said “fourth place or higher,” meaning that 28 of the 31 players said they expected to finish in the fourth or eighth place .In particular, fans’ expectations for the ‘last dance’ were high as Ji So-yeon (Suwon FC), Park Eun-sun (Seoul Metropolitan Government), Cho So-hyun (Tottenham), Kim Jung-mi (Hyundai Steel), and Kim Hye-ri (Hyundai Steel) are in their mid-to-late 30s and are likely to play their last World Cup. Many media outlets also touted the team’s goal of reaching the quarterfinals before the tournament began However, when the lid was lifted, the walls of the world were high .After a 0-2 loss to Colombia in the first round, the team lost 0-1 to Morocco, failing to score a goal in two consecutive matches .Especially against Morocco, the team had 14 shots on goal, but none of them were on target .In fact, given South Korea’s track record in the Women’s World Cup, the quarterfinals goal was a bit reckless .Including the two losses in this tournament, South Korea has just one win, one draw and 10 losses in the Women’s World Cup, and has lost six straight 스포츠토토존 matches dating back to the Round of 16 against France in 2015.They have not scored a goal in five of those six games, including a 1-2 loss to Norway in the final match of the 2019 tournament. Their chances of reaching the round of 16 are now virtually nil. If Germany wins the Germany-Colombia match on Tuesday evening, or if the two teams draw, South Korea will be eliminated in the round of 16.If Colombia defeats Germany, they can keep their hopes alive until the third group game on Aug. 3.If South Korea defeats Germany and Colombia defeats Morocco, South Korea, Germany, and Morocco will all have one win and two losses and will play on goal difference. However, even in this case, the pressure is on South Korea to defeat Germany by a large margin if they want to punch their ticket to the Round of 16, as the Germans have already thrashed Morocco 6-0 in the first leg.