Thailand Beat Singapore on Aggregate to Reach ASEAN Championship Final
**Thailand advanced to the ASEAN Championship final 4-3 on aggregate despite losing the second leg 2-1 at home in Bangkok on Tuesday**. **A first-leg 3-1 win in Singapore proved decisive as the seven-time champions absorbed late pressure to survive**. **Kakana Khamyol’s 61st-minute penalty was the key moment of the second leg, with Teerasak Poeiphimai twice striking the post in the closing stages**. **Thailand now await the winner of the other semifinal, where defending champions Vietnam lead Malaysia 2-0 after the first leg**. Thailand are through to the ASEAN Championship final — but they had to survive a Singapore ambush to get there. A 3-1 win in the first leg gave the seven-time champions just enough breathing room to withstand a 2-1 defeat on their own turf in Bangkok on Tuesday night, edging the tie 4-3 on aggregate. The damage that mattered most had already been done in Singapore days earlier, where Thailand raced into a two-goal cushion. Tuesday’s return leg was supposed to be a coronation. It nearly turned into a horror show instead. Singapore struck first, and it came from a mistake. Thailand goalkeeper Kampon Phatomakkakul strayed off his line to clear a loose ball just before the interval, only to be caught out. Harhys Stewart pounced on the loose ball and drilled it home from distance, sending the away side in at halftime with genuine belief. The contest tightened further after the break. In the 61st minute, Ryhan Stewart brought down Wanchai Jarunongkran inside the box, and substitute Kakana Khamyol stepped up to bury the resulting penalty into the top corner — levelling the second leg and eating into Thailand’s aggregate advantage. Four minutes later, Singapore struck again. Ryhan Stewart’s low effort took a cruel deflection off Thai defender Pansa Hemviboon. It looped beyond a wrong-footed Phatomakkakul for an own goal, handing Singapore a 2-1 lead on the night and putting the tie right on a knife’s edge.  Singapore threw everything forward in search of the away goal to complete the turnaround. Thailand dug in. The home side weathered wave after wave of pressure before finding their legs again on the counter, and Teerasak Poeiphimai twice rattled the woodwork in the closing minutes — denied by the frame of the goal rather than by Singapore’s goalkeeper. The scoreline held at 2-1, and with it, Thailand’s aggregate lead survived intact at 4-3. Head coach Anthony Hudson didn’t hide his mixed emotions after the final whistle. He called reaching the final a major achievement for a squad he described as young and blended. Still, he admitted he was frustrated with how his team performed on the night, conceding they had done enough across ninety minutes to have earned a draw rather than a defeat. The result sends Thailand into the final for the latest edition of the region’s biggest football prize, where they’ll face either Vietnam or Malaysia. That tie is far from settled but leans heavily in the defending champions’ favour — Vietnam took a commanding 2-0 lead in the first leg in Kuala Lumpur on Sunday, leaving Malaysia needing a big result of their own in the second leg to keep their title defence alive.
