Pohang Steelers 1-1 Gamba Osaka Highlights, AFC Champions League Two, Round Of 16: All Squared Up After First Leg

Good afternoon, football fans! This is the start of our live blog covering the match between Pohang Steelers and Gamba Osaka. Stay tuned for pre-match updates and line-ups as they are released.

• Fixture: Pohang Steelers vs Gamba Osaka, Ro16 first leg

• Series: AFC Champions League Two 2025-26

• Venue: Pohang Steel Yard, South Korea

• Date: Thursday, February 12, 2026

• Time: 3:30 PM IST

• Live Streaming: FanCode

Starting XI: In-jae Hwang; Min-jun Hang, Min-Kwang Jeon (c), Chan-yong Park; Juninho Rocha, Sung-Yeung Ki, Jeong-won Eo, Kento Nishiya; Hwan Seo-woong, Lee Ho-jae, Jorge Teixeira.

Bench: Sung-min Hong (gk), Hyeon-seo Han, Ye-Sung Kim, Jin Si-Woo, Yong-hak Kim, Jae-Hwan Hwang, Dong-jin Kim, Chang-woo Lee, An Jae-jun, In-sung Kim, Jakob Tranziska, Sang-hyeok Cho.

Starting XI: Masaaki Higashiguchi; Riku Handa, Shinnosuke Nakatani (c), Shogo Sasaki, Ryo Hatsuse; Shuto Abe, Tokuma Suzuki; Ryoya Yamashita, Issam Jebali, Ryotaro Meshino; Deniz Hummet.

Bench: Aolin Zhang (gk), Rui Araki (gk), Takeru Kishimoto, Genta Miura, Jiro Nakamura, Rin Mito, Shu Kurata, Harumi Minamino, Gaku Nawata, Shoji Toyama.

Gamba Osaka had a perfect Group F campaign of six straight wins, while Pohang Steelers progressed as the Group H runners-up, with one loss and a draw as well. The Japanese side thus starts as favourite tonight, on paper.

The match gets underway at the Pohang Steel Yard. The hosts kicking from left to right and Gamba Osaka the other way in the first half. The Japanese side create an early chance but Pohang are able to ward off the threat.

After withstanding a sustained period of pressing by Pohang, Gamba are now starting to come into the game a bit more. The Japanese team is circulating the ball around the flanks and trying to find an opening, but there is none as yet.

The next game today in AFC Champions League Two pits Bangkok United against Macarthur FC at the Pathum Thani Stadium in Thailand at 5:45pm IST. The hosts face a stern challenge in the form of Macarthur, with the Australian club topping Group E by a big margin. Bangkok United, on the other hand, endured a tougher Group G campaign, advancing as the runners-up narrowly.

The first half ends goalless. After an eventful start to the game with chances for both sides, play meandered a bit later on. Let's see if the second half plays out any differently.

The players are back from the mid-game interval and the second half gets underway. The Steel Warriors now kicking from right to left and Gamba Osaka in the opposite direction.

Gamba Osaka strike in the 47th minute! The Japanese club wastes no time in gaining ascendance after the second half kicks off, as Ryoya Yamashita unleashes a superb curling right-footed shot that swerves past Pohang defenders to thud into the back of the net.

Pohang have found their equaliser in the 70th minute! And it's an even more stunning strike than the opener by Yamashita for Gamba Osaka. Jorge Teixeira it is, with a pearler that nestles into the top right corner. No chance for the visiting goalie there.

Just three minutes remain before the regulation 90 minutes end, plus whatever stoppage time is added by the officials. Can either team edge ahead in the two-leg encounter with a late goal?

After six minutes of added time, the referee blows the final whistle to bring the first leg of this round of 16 encounter to an end. It's all squared up at 1-1, and the second leg, to be played on February 19 at the Suita City Stadium, thus becomes a winner-takes-all one.