FC Seoul suffered a painful defeat in its first official match of 2026.
Seoul lost 0-2 to Vissel Kobe on the 10th at Kobe Misaki Park Stadium in Japan in the 2025-26 Asian Football Confederation (AFC) Champions League Elite (ACLE) league stage round 7, conceding two goals in the second half.
With this, Seoul recorded 2 wins, 3 draws and 2 losses (9 points) and remained in fifth place. The point gap with ninth-place Gangwon FC (7 points) is only two points. Seoul is in a situation where advancement to the round of 16 cannot be guaranteed.
With the victory, Kobe recorded 5 wins, 1 draw and 1 loss (16 points) and firmly held the top spot in the East Asia region. In ACLE, 12 teams each in the East and West play the league stage, and only the top eight teams advance to the tournament. Seoul must go all out and win the final match.
After Jesse Lingard left, Seoul introduced changes by starting five newly signed players—Song Min-gyu, Hui-ju, Babetz, Guh Seong-yun, and Ross. But the aftermath of the lineup changes was significant. Seoul, whose organization was not fully prepared, struggled from the early stages of the match against Kobe's strong pressing and fast tempo.
In the 14th minute of the first half, Seoul faced a scoring threat, but supporters breathed a sigh of relief as an offside was called on Kobe's goal scene. After that, Kobe maintained control, but Seoul held firm and kept the first half scoreless at 0-0.
The flow of the match did not change significantly in the second half. Seoul focused on defense and sought openings with counterattacks using Hui-ju and Anderson, but its attacking development was not smooth. In the 17th minute of the second half, Song Min-gyu was replaced by Moon Seon-min in an attempt to change things, but there was no clear effect.
The balance finally collapsed in the 24th minute of the second half. In a quick counterattack by Kobe, Muto Yoshinori scored the opening goal. Before Seoul could recover from the shock of conceding, it conceded an additional goal to Sakai Gōtoku in the 28th minute of the second half and collapsed.
Seoul brought on Jo Young-wook, Klimala, and Hwang Do-yun in succession to launch a counterattack, but ultimately could not break through Kobe's solid defense. The first official match of 2026 remained a bitter goalless defeat for Seoul.
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