The Winning Try episode 2 review: when dignity hits harder than the scoreboard, and at least Hanyang High tried

The second episode of The Winning Try builds something honest out of tension, pressure, and control. A disgraced athlete, a discarded team, and a game chosen to humiliate. None of it points to hope; however, somehow, effort reshapes the frame.

Ga‑ram plays with instinct, not redemption. Seong‑jun runs with a weight that makes each step mean more. The boys around them begin to listen, to watch each other, to adjust, to move as if being seen could mean something, and it does.

The offer to Tae‑pung at the end of this episode of the new rugby K-drama The Winning Try cuts through the celebration. The story refuses to settle. Every moment of pride answers to a force that wants to undo it.

However, The Winning Try never promised comfort. It promises movement. It shows what happens when people keep playing long after the rules turned against them.

In The Winning Try, Ga‑ram has to play the game behind the game

In The Winning Try, Ga‑ram leans into the chaos people expect from him and turns it into a weapon. His reputation buys him just enough space to do something bold. Of course the match against Daesang, the top team in the league, wasn’t Ga‑ram’s idea. It was a setup from the vice principal, designed to humiliate them in front of the entire school.

But Ga‑ram adapts. He turns a trap into an opportunity. Kowing that visibility is part of survival, and if they’re going to be used as spectacle, then they’ll decide how the story lands. The team may lose, but the way they lose can change everything. In The Winning Try, the title is much more than just that: it's an underlying mesage.

From the start, it becomes clear that the forces shaping this season are not driven by the sport. Adults make decisions in silence, guided by power and convenience. It leaves a bitter taste, especially now that the players are starting to care. Ga‑ram keeps going because the game still holds meaning. The sweat is real. The movement is real. Once the match begins, Hanyang stays on its feet.

The try shifts the air. Students in the stands begin to cheer, caught off guard by their own excitement. A team once ignored becomes part of the noise, part of the school. The scoreboard remains distant, but something real takes root on that field. Hanyang High starts to matter. This is the very heart of The Winning Try.

Seong‑jun runs forward, and the others follow

Seong‑jun comes back because something shifts when he sees the team again. Ga‑ram embarrasses himself with a megaphone in front of his house, but what cuts deeper is what comes after. Seong‑jun watches the others train. He sees movement. He sees effort. And he chooses to return.

The way he plays changes everything. There is control in his steps, weight in his body, clarity in how he sees the field. He sets the pace. The others begin to match it. They fall, get back up, move faster. Not because the game becomes winnable, but because the presence of someone who takes it seriously makes the game feel real.

The reveal about his twin brother comes with no drama, only precision. His brother is a global soccer star. Seong‑jun carries that fact like a stone in his shoe. It explains the pressure. It deepens the silence. It turns every pass and tackle into something heavier. And that weight, when channeled into motion, reshapes the entire match in this episode of The Winning Try.

I‑ji watches Ga‑ram and feels the weight behind his silence

When The Winning Try starts, three years pass without a single word, and when Ga‑ram finally stands in front of I‑ji again, he acts like nothing ever broke. He doesn’t ask how she is, doesn’t explain where he went, and doesn’t offer any opening for a real conversation. Instead, he tells her to stop smoking, as if that’s all there is to say.

In The Winning Try, no one talks in depth about what happened to Ga‑ram and no one examines what he lost, but everything about the way he holds himself now suggests that whatever broke inside him settled into place and started to speak for him.

I‑ji doesn’t ask for explanations and doesn’t wait for one either. She listens, watches, and finishes something that was already coming apart. Whatever they once shared ends there, quietly, without a word, with the weight of his voice saying more than he knows how to control.

Tae‑pung receives an offer that rewrites the match

The second episode of The Winning Try ends with a shift that says more than any score. Tae‑pung, one of the strongest players on the team, receives an offer from Daesang. The timing speaks clearly. They waited for the game. They watched him play. And they reached out.

This isn’t about potential. It’s about control. Daesang holds power and uses it with precision. They invite talent only after making sure it bleeds. The offer works like a warning. Hanyang stepped out of line. This is the correction.

The match already felt strange. Too convenient. Too early. The invitation to compete came from someone who wanted to measure them up close. Now they target the core. Not with punishment. With paperwork. With decisions dressed as praise. This is how things are rolling in The Winning Try.

Tae‑pung stands at the center of something larger. He carries the weight of the offer while the others carry the cost. Hanyang plays together, but will everyone will stay?

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Rating with a touch of flair: 5 out of 5 fractured plays that still land clean

A match thrown like a trap. A team treated like bait. A coach who turns every insult into instruction. The real try isn’t the point on the board. It’s the act of showing up anyway.

The series has already made me care for them and a sport I never even cared about in the first place. what about you? Already all-in?