2015 AFC Asian Cup Final

Prior to the tournament, the two finalists had previously met each other 26 times, with South Korea winning nine games and Australia ten.[3] The two sides first met on 14 November 1967 in the final of the 1967 Quoc Khanh Cup, held in South Vietnam. Australia won the match 3–2 and secured the nation's first honour in international football.[4] The last meeting between the two teams, a 0–0 draw, took place on 20 July 2013, at the 2013 EAFF East Asian Cup in South Korea. Australia, who began the 2015 Asian Cup as one of the favourites,[5] was ranked 100 in the FIFA World Rankings and tenth among AFC teams, while South Korea was ranked 69 overall, and third among AFC teams.

South Korea entered the 2015 Asian Cup as two-time Asian champions, having won the first two instalments of the tournament. However, the 2015 final was South Korea's first appearance in the final in 26 years and only their third appearance in the final since a knockout system was introduced. South Korea was first crowned champions of Asia in the inaugural 1956 edition of the Asian Cup, held in Hong Kong. There, the competition was formatted as a round-robin tournament between four teams with no final, and South Korea won the tournament after just three matches. South Korea successfully defended their title in 1960 on home soil. It was not until 1972 that South Korea would get the chance to contest the Asian title again, in the tournament's first ever final after the change to a knockout format. South Korea lost the match against Iran 2–1 in extra time. South Korea again failed to win the final match in 1980, when they lost 3–0 against host nation Kuwait. In 1988, South Korea contested the final against Saudi Arabia in Qatar. After remaining scoreless at the end of extra time, the match was decided in a penalty shoot-out, with the Saudis taking home the title through a 4–3 win.

The 2015 final was Australia's second consecutive time contesting an Asian Cup final out of only three appearances since moving to the Asian Football Confederation from the Oceania Football Confederation in 2006. In 2011, Australia lost to Japan 1–0 in extra time.

Stadium Australia in Sydney hosted the 2015 AFC Asian Cup Final

Stadium Australia was announced as the venue of the 2015 final on 27 March 2013, along with the announcement of the five stadiums used in the tournament.[6] The venue was chosen in preference to Melbourne Rectangular Stadium, which was instead selected to host the opening match of the tournament between Australia and Kuwait. The stadium chosen for the final had the largest capacity of those used in the tournament, with a capacity crowd of 84,000. It was first opened in 1999, and was built to host the 2000 Sydney Olympics. The venue has played host to a number of Sydney's major sporting events, and it was used for seven matches in the 2015 AFC Asian Cup, including four group matches, a quarter-final and semi-final match, as well as the final.[7]

Australia's opening match against Kuwait at the Melbourne Rectangular Stadium

Both South Korea and Australia were drawn into Group A of the 2015 AFC Asian Cup, along with lower ranked sides Oman and Kuwait. After winning all three group matches, South Korea finished first in the group. Host nation Australia finished second in the group to progress to the knockout stage of the tournament.

Australia

Australia's Asian Cup run started in the opening match of the tournament against Kuwait. Hussain Fadhel's eighth-minute header had briefly dampened spirits at a sold out Melbourne Rectangular Stadium only for Massimo Luongo to set up Tim Cahill on the 33rd minute to equalise with his 37th international goal. After Luongo headed home his first for Australia at the end of the first half, a penalty from captain Mile Jedinak on the 62nd minute and a late strike from James Troisi secured all three points for Australia.[13] In their second match, Australia played Oman in Sydney. Goals from Matt McKay, Robbie Kruse, Tomi Juric, and a penalty scored by Mark Milligan gave Australia a 0–4 win.[14] After failing to secure any points from their final group match against South Korea, Australia next faced Group B winners China PR in the quarter-finals in Brisbane Stadium. Cahill opened the scoring shortly after the half-time break before doubling the lead midway through the second-half, ensuring Australia reached the last four.[15] In the semi-finals, Australia faced United Arab Emirates in Newcastle Stadium. A 2–0 result with goals from Trent Sainsbury and Jason Davidson sent Australia into their second consecutive Asian Cup final.[16]

South Korea		Round	Australia
Opponent	Result	Group stage	Opponent	Result
Oman	1–0	Match 1	Kuwait	4–1
Kuwait	1–0	Match 2	Oman	4–0
Australia	1–0	Match 3	South Korea	0–1
Group A winner Team Pld W D L GF GA GD Pts  South Korea 3 3 0 0 3 0 +3 9  Australia 3 2 0 1 8 2 +6 6  Oman 3 1 0 2 1 5 −4 3  Kuwait 3 0 0 3 1 6 −5 0		Final standings	Group A runner-up Team Pld W D L GF GA GD Pts  South Korea 3 3 0 0 3 0 +3 9  Australia 3 2 0 1 8 2 +6 6  Oman 3 1 0 2 1 5 −4 3  Kuwait 3 0 0 3 1 6 −5 0
Opponent	Result	Knockout stage	Opponent	Result
Uzbekistan	2–0 (a.e.t.)	Quarter-finals	China PR	2–0
Iraq	2–0	Semi-finals	United Arab Emirates	2–0

Havana Brown performed at the closing ceremony

Individual match tickets for the final were sold directly by the AFC via its website from 3 June 2014.[17] The final was also included the Sydney "Venue Pack", which gave access to every match of the tournament played in Sydney. 76,000 seats were made available for the final clash, with roughly 7,000 seats kept by the AFC to accommodate media and other parties.[18] Prices varied from $39 to $150.[19] 66,000 tickets had been sold for the final prior to Australia's semi-final match in 2.7 minutes, with more than 10,000 additional tickets sold within 1.4 minutes of the win for Australia.[18]

Iranian Alireza Faghani was named as the referee of the final, together with fellow countrymen Reza Sokhandan and Mohammad Reza Abolfazli as the assistant referees. The trio had officiated in four 2015 Asian Cup matches, including group matches between Saudi Arabia and China PR, Kuwait and South Korea and Iraq and Japan, and the quarter-final match between Japan and United Arab Emirates. Faghani had previously taken charge of a number of international matches, with the most notable being the 2009 AFC President's Cup Final, 2010 AFC Challenge Cup Final and the 2014 AFC Champions League Final first leg match.

The closing ceremony of the 2015 AFC Asian Cup took place at the Stadium Australia, before the final match of the tournament. As with the opening ceremony of the tournament, the closing ceremony featured a performance by Australian DJ, singer and dancer Havana Brown.[20]

The win meant that Australia has become the first-ever nation to win in two continental competitions, having won four OFC Nations Cup before moving to the AFC in 2006, and also gave Australia the first-ever Asian title.[25] For this achievement, Australia went on to represent Asia in the 2017 FIFA Confederations Cup held in Russia, its fourth participation but the first, and final participation in the tournament as an AFC member after new FIFA President Gianni Infantino decided to abolish it in 2018.[26]

For the South Koreans, this disheartening loss to Australia extended the country's Asian Cup drought. Since winning it at home in 1960, South Korea has made appearances in three other Asian Cup Finals before this one, and all ended up South Korea losing.[27] It was also the last game for veteran Cha Du-ri, who retired from international football following the end of the match.[27]

Nonetheless, Son Heung-min's bright performance throughout the competition made him attractive to major giants in Europe, which led him to transfer from Bayer 04 Leverkusen to Tottenham. With £22 million, he became the most expensive player in Asian football history.[28]

Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott was invited to attend but did not due to vote counting for the 2015 Queensland state election taking place at the same time.[29] Abbott had already attended the opening match of the tournament between Australia and Kuwait in Melbourne.[30] Other invited guests present for the final include FIFA President Sepp Blatter, AFC President Salman Al-Khalifa and Chairman of Football Federation Australia Frank Lowy. Blatter and Al-Khalifa delivered the trophy to the champions in the awards ceremony, amidst boos from the crowd.[31]

The match was broadcast live in Australia by the ABC and Fox Sports. The ABC's coverage of the match averaged 1.8 million viewers nationally for the entire match, with a total reach of 5.3 million Australians overall. The ABC' peak audience was 3 million viewers watching at 22:27 AEDT, in the final minute of extra time. The game also averaged 416,000 for Fox Sports' coverage.[32]

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