With the South Korean national soccer team’s first victory under Jürgen Klinsmann on the line, captain Son Heung-min (Tottenham Hotspur) opens up about the team’s lack of success, his physical condition, and a rumored move to the Saudi Arabian league. 먹튀검증
The South Korean national soccer team played El Salvador to a 1-1 draw in an exhibition match at Daejeon World Cup Stadium on Tuesday. Hwang Eui-jo (Seoul) gave South Korea the lead in the fourth minute of the second half, but conceded a header to Alex Roldan in the 42nd minute from an opposing free kick.
Son “Captain” Heung-min was benched against Peru on June 16, the first game of a two-game A-Match series, before coming on as a substitute later that day. This was due to the aftermath of a sports hernia, which he underwent surgery on after his team’s final match of the season.
“It’s a secret,” Son told the media after the game, when asked about the condition of his surgical site. “I don’t think I’m in pain, but I’m scared,” he said, adding, “I’ve been sick for a long time. I ran for eight months. There’s still a lot of, ‘I was in so much pain when I did this, I’m going to be in pain when I do this,'” he confessed.
“Now I’m free for a few weeks,” he said, “and I think if I rest and recover well, I’ll definitely be back to 100% next season.”
He also addressed the Saudi transfer rumors. On the same day, global sports outlet ESPN reported that “Son Heung-min has been offered a contract worth €30 million ($42.1 billion) per season for four years”. The Saudi club in question is Al-Ittihad, and there are also reports that the club has prepared a huge bonus for Son to sign.
“I like the (English) Premier League, and I think I still have a lot of work to do in the Premier League,” Son said. “My brother (Ki Sung-yong) once said, ‘The captain of the Korean national team doesn’t go to the Chinese league,'” he added. He was referring to ‘the Korean captain doesn’t go to the Saudi league’.
“For me, money is not important. For me, football, pride in football, and playing in the league I love is the most important thing,” he said, adding, “I have a lot of work to do in the Premier League, so I will do well at Tottenham. I will go back and prepare well.” 안전토토사이트
It’s been an eventful season for Son, who went under the knife with a fractured orbital bone in November of last year, and then went on to play in the World Cup in Qatar wearing a mask, leading South Korea to the round of 16.
“I’ve been playing professionally for quite a while, and I think it was the time I learned the most,” he said. “It’s a good feeling in a way because it made me realize that I can learn more and improve as a person and as a player. I hope I can come back next season in a better shape than this season.”
He called for “patience” when it comes to the national team’s four-game winless streak under Klinsmann. “We were not at 100 percent for this call-up either. I tried to give the players a lot of information about how the coach wants us to play, but it’s not easy to take off the clothes we wore with the previous coach, Paulo Bento. He knows that,” he said.
“For the fans, it’s like, ‘Why can’t we win this game, we should win this game,’ but I don’t think there’s a game that’s a must-win,” he said. “I think we can be a good team if we build it over time. We’ll see how we progress from the next call-up.”