Dragons Get First Win

It wasn't pretty, but it was an entertaining win for Jeonnam on Sunday. Currently sitting fifth in the table, the Dragons are one of only three unbeaten teams in the young 2015 season.

Though the Dragons had what felt like much more possession, it only amounted to 55%.  For large swaths of time they controlled the ball in the midfield, took the Incheon half of the field, and then ran out of ideas. Though they recorded 8 shots on target, nearly all were directly at United keeper Hyun Yoo. Far too many from distance with little to no chance of beating a pro keeper.

Hyo-Jin Choi did not suffer from this issue. In what was easily the Dragons best chance in the first half, he belted one to the far post in the 44th minute, forcing Yoo into a decent save that he couldn't hold on to. The ball landed almost directly at the feet of an unsuspecting Stevica Ristić who couldn't do anything with it.

Incheon came out strong in the first 10 minutes of the second, but failed to create anything meaningful in the final third. It was during this stretch that they recorded the lion's share of the 11 (yes 11) shots wide for the game.

Just 15 minutes before his goal, Jong-Ho Lee had a cheeky little backheel to send Young-Min Hyun down the line. Hyun's cross was slightly behind Yong-Woo Ahn, who still managed to get it down and put on a decent shot. This lovely little piece of footwork was promptly followed by the "wide shot" session of the second half, which saw the Dragons narrowly miss out on taking the lead several times. Another fantastic chance fell to Ristić in the 65th minute when another deflected ball found its way to his feet. His attempted chip was too low and hit Yoo more out of gravity doing its job than an actual save.

Then the magic happened. Keeping with the theme of the day, Jong-Ho Lee's shot was deflected off a defender and found its way to the back of the net. To be fair, Lee's moves to get into possession and find some space were more than enough to put the Soccer Gods on his side and put that ball where it belonged. To the Dragons credit, they kept their foot on the gas after the goal and continued to take the game to Incheon. They comfortably saw out the final 16 and change for their first win.

The win set up the rare meaningful game this early in the season with 3rd place Suwon coming to town. The Bluewings are coming off a 3 - 1 win against the Brisbane Roar in AFC Champions League action that has them playing on some tired legs. Combine this with Jeonnam's stingy defense that's allowed only two goals through four games, and the Dragons seem set up quite well in this six point swing game.