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Senior Moderator
Join Date: Jun 2005
Location: New Jersey
Posts: 23,705
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Re: South Korea National Team
SOUTH KOREA
Nickname: "The Reds" or the "Taeguk Warriors"
An electronics and tech giant, this small country is an anomaly in Asia. By turns proud and belligerent, and yet also deeply socialized in the group mechanics that typify most of Asia, Korea is a weird place.
An independent, isolated and comparatively poor kingdom for almost a millennia, Korea was always in the shadow of — as well as closely influenced by — China, and has always had something akin to the "small guy" syndrome; something of a chip on its shoulder, a brashness that is not unbecoming, and a proud bit of difference.
Take the very language of Korea: it is unique in Asia in that it is NOT ideogrammatically based as Chinese and Japanese are; the hangul (written) alphabet has 24 characters and the spoken (called urimal or gugeo) is what linguists call a "language isolate," meaning that is bears no roots to any other known spoken language on the planet (in comparison, the Romance languages — Spanish, French, Italian — are rooted in Latin).
Korean cuisine has similar flair. While touched by Chinese, Mongolian and Japanese dishes, Korean food incorporates flourishes of French, sauce-based cooking (perhaps imported from Vietnam), barbecue, and the pungent, native cabbage dish of kimchee. Modern Korea has yet to recover psychologically from the brutal Japanese occupation at the turn of the 20th Century and the partitioning of an already small country by the Korean War (1950-53). It has an enormous expatriate community in the United States.
Baseball was once its top sport, but since 2002, the K-League rules the roost, and the country is wildly attentive to and passionate about the national team. The comings and goings of the national side are covered with an exhaustive fervor that rivals America's intense scrutiny of the NFL.
The Korean press corps following the team is a several-hundred strong gaggle with an unquenchable thirst to ask the same questions over and over to anyone they can get their hands on. They are single-minded: if you are ascertained to be at all familiar with the sport of soccer, a Korean national will invariably ask you for your opinion on their team, regardless of the setting or situation.
Unfortunately, their team is unskilled. This, combined with the nation's grandly delusional (and to be fair, uninformed) opinion of their side's strength makes for a potent, woe-filled cocktail on the streets of Seoul.
PAST WORLD CUP SUCCESS: South Korea have made the World Cup finals six times (1954, 1986, 1990, 1994, 1998, 2002), and have taken part in every finals since 1986. Co-hosts of the 2002 competition, South Korea's fourth place finish was nothing short of a miracle. They had never even won a game in the finals prior to 2002.
REGIONAL SUCCESS: Asian Cup winners twice (1956, 1960), and Asian Games winners three times (1970 together with Burma, 1978 together with Korea DPR, 1986).
LEAGUE OVERVIEW: The K-League is not bad. It's not very good either, but considering it only got going about eight years ago, "not bad" really isn't bad.
MANAGER: Dick Advocaat. Hired in October of 2005, Advocaat took over from his wildly unpopular countryman Jo Bonfrere, who, despite taking the team into the finals, was incessantly criticized by the KFA and the media for his personality (dour) approach (workmanlike) and the team's lack of zest (largely due to the fact that the players aren't very good). Advocaat was an un-flashy, hard-working midfielder in his playing days (with ADO Den Haag, Utrecht and, believe it or not, The Chicago Sting from 1977-80) but made his name in coaching as an assistant to the legendary Rinus Michels. He is often called the "Little General," a reference to his tenure under Michels, who is known in Holland as "The General."
In charge of Holland, Advocaat steered the Dutch to a quarterfinal berth at the WCUSA1994 and then took PSV Eindhoven to the Dutch Cup (1996) and the league title (1997). In 1998, he led the revilalisation of Glasgow Rangers, winning all three Scottish titles (League Cup, FA Cup, SPL title). In 1999, he took Rangers into the Champions League for the first time and again won the SPL crown.
Advocaat returned to take the Dutch national team through the 2004 European championships but his tenure was far rockier: He endured withering criticism in the media after being forced into a playoff against Scotland (they won 6-1 on aggregate) to make the finals but despite reaching the semifinals, the side played poorly in a 2-1 loss to Portugal to go out. Advocaat received death threats and resigned. He held the reins at German side Borussia Moenchengladbach but resigned (April 2005) after just under six months in charge.
KEY PLAYERS: Lee Dong-Gook (KDR: Pohang Steelers) Park Ji-Sung (ENG: Manchester United) Lee Young-Pyo (ENG: Tottenham)
FIFA RANKING: 30th. They've been as high as 17th and as low as 62nd.
FIRST ROUND OPPONENTS: France, Switzerland, Togo
HEAD TO HEAD AGAINST WORLD CUP OPPONENTS
FRANCE: France has played Korea twice in the new millennium, dealing Korea a loss in both matches. At the 2001 Confederations Cup, France walloped Korea 5-0 at Daegu. In a friendly the following year, France recovered from a 2-1 halftime deficit to win 3-2 in Suwon in what proved to be a harbinger of Korea's success in 2002.
SWITZERLAND: The two sides have never met.
TOGO: Korea and Togo have never met one another.
HOW THEY QUALIFIED: South Korea officially sealed the deal on June 8th with a 4-0 drubbing of Kuwait that was marred by fans throwing projectiles at the ref, pitch and players after a spot kick was awarded in the first half. The game was suspended for 10 minutes. They didn't have much trouble, but the perfectionist (and wildly insecure) Korean press judged their performances harshly. Lee Dong-Gook led the Koreans in qualifying with 5 goals.
PERCENTAGE CHANCE TO PROGRESS IN THE 2006 CUP: This is a tough one to call, as it is unclear which team will show up. In 2002, the Reds took the world by shock, finishing fourth in perhaps one of the greatest Cinderella Cup stories ever. In everyday reality, however, South Korea isn't a very good team. Their players are comparatively unskilled and rely heavily on their size making them vulnerable to even the most rudimentary tactics.
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