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Football

14th Feb 2024

Son Heung-min suffered injured finger in table tennis row with teammates

Callum Boyle

Son Heung-min

Of all the games

The eagle-eyed amongst you may have noticed that son Heung-min had his fingers strapped up when he made his return to the Spurs side at the weekend.

After heartbreak in the Asian Cup semi-finals, the South Korea international returned to come off the bench and provided the assist for Brennan Johnson’s 96th minute winner in the 2-1 victory against Brighton and Hove Albion.

While it may seem nothing more than an innocent injury, Son’s taped-up fingers were all because of an altercation between members of the South Korea squad hours before their 2-0 semi-final defeat to Jordan.

South Korea stars row over table tennis

On the night before the game, several members – mostly the younger associates – of the squad chose to play a game of table tennis.

But as revealed by an official of the South Korean Football Federation, Son and others “took issue” and after a few exchanged verbals, the 31-year-old hurt his fingers.

Shock defeat leaves Klinsmann on the brink

South Korea were the overwhelming favourites as they aimed to end their 64-year wait for an Asian Cup title but were dumped out in shocking fashion.

Jordan, who are ranked 87th in the world – 64 places behind South Korea – convincingly won 2-0 before losing the final to host nation Qatar, leading to calls for Jurgen Klinsmann to be sacked.

Son Heung-min

Klinsmann took full responsibility for the defeat, saying: “We had the big goal of playing in the final but Jordan deserves this win, they deserve to play in the final.

“I’m not planning to do anything, I will analyse this tournament, go back to Korea with the team and talk with the federation about what was good and not so good in the tournament.”

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