South Korea added three more points after defeating its home team Thailand 3-0 thanks to Lee Jae-sung, Son Heung-min, and Park Jin-seop’s consecutive goals in the fourth Group C match of the 2026 North-Central America World Cup Asian qualifiers held at Rajamangala Stadium in Bangkok, Thailand on the 26th. With this, South Korea maintained its lead in the group with three wins and one draw (10 points), securing an advantageous position to advance to the third qualifying round just by drawing with Singapore in the fifth away game in June.
China won 4-1 at a home game against Singapore, ranking second with two wins, one draw and one loss (seven points). A home game against Thailand in June will likely be a watershed moment in securing the second place.
Indonesia and Malaysia, led by a Korean leader, also had mixed feelings. Indonesia in Group F led by coach Shin Tae-yong secured a 3-0 win at an away match in Vietnam, increasing its chances of qualifying for the third round with two wins, one draw and one loss (seven points). Malaysia, led by Kim Pan-gon, is ranking third in Group D with two wins and two losses after losing 0-2 at home to Oman.
Australia, Iraq, Iran, Uzbekistan, the United Arab Emirates, and Qatar continued cruising to secure at least the second place in their group and advanced to the third qualifying round early with two more matches to go. The first and second-ranked teams in the nine groups in the second qualifying round will advance to the third qualifying round for the 2026 North and Central America World Cup, and will secure a berth to the 2027 AFC Saudi Arabia Asian Cup.
The tickets for the 2026 North-Central America World Cup finals will be divided into nine groups of four teams through seeding and draw, with 36 countries, including 11 countries that passed the first round qualifying round, and nine first-place teams in each group and nine second-place teams in each group will qualify for the 2027 AFC Asian Cup finals along with advancing to the third round of the World Cup.
The 18 teams that advanced to the third round of the preliminary round will be divided into three groups of six teams and compete for six tickets among 8.33 tickets for the 2026 North-Central America World Cup that have been allocated to Asia, with the first and second place teams in each group advancing to the World Cup finals. Six teams that rank third and fourth in each group will be divided into two groups for the fourth round of the preliminary round to compete for 2.33 tickets.