Kim Eun-joong, who tried to reproduce the ‘Miracle in Poland’ that heated up Korea four years ago, faced a tough obstacle from the start. There is no field trip, and the time difference due to the huge distance is also a problem. He is in the same situation as asking to find a destination without a compass in a thick fog where one cannot see an inch ahead.
The Korean national under-20 (U-20) soccer team, led by coach Kim Eun-joong, convened at the Paju National Training Center (NFC) on the 24th and began training for three days. Korea, which will participate in the 2023 FIFA U-20 World Cup to be held in Argentina from the 20th of next month to the 11th of June in local time, is in Group F with France, Gambia and Honduras.
The World Cup is just around the corner, and coach Kim’s head is complicated. Above all, there is not much time left. The World Cup was originally scheduled to be held in Indonesia. However, antipathy toward Israel participating in the tournament increased in Indonesia, an Islamic country, and even when the safety of the Israeli team came to a situation where it was not guaranteed, FIFA revoked the right to host the tournament last month, and then rushed to select Argentina as the new host. . The schedule for the group draw ceremony, which was scheduled to be held last month, was naturally delayed, and it was finally able to be held on the 21st. Coach Kim, whose schedule was twisted, did not attend the group drawing ceremony and prepared for this convocation training.
As the new venue was decided so hastily, there was a setback in the essential ‘field survey’. Originally, coach Kim was scheduled to fly to Argentina after this convocation and inspect the base camp and stadium while inspecting the field. However, according to the Korea Football Association, the entire national team took the lead to leave for Argentina on the 7th of next month and practice local adaptation without a field trip. This is about a week earlier than originally planned. The reason is that as the venue has changed in a hurry, FIFA hastily started to grasp the local situation, and it is meaningless to conduct a field trip at this point.
If it was held in Indonesia, there would be nothing bad for director Kim. Coach Kim had played a tournament as a coach under coach Kim Hak-beom, who was the national team coach at the time of the 2018 Asian Games in Jakarta and Palembang. Although Indonesia has hot weather, it may have been easier to prepare for coach Kim, who has experience. Coach Kim also expressed regret, saying, “Indonesia is where we won the gold medal at the Asian Games, and I was confident because I was used to the environment, but the situation has changed.”스포츠토토
With the game being held in Argentina, which is on the opposite side of Korea, jet lag has also emerged as a big problem. This is evident in the fact that coach Kim emphasized that “adapting to jet lag is the biggest problem” at a press conference before training. The time difference between Korea and Argentina is 12 hours. The flight distance alone reaches 19,000 km, and the flight time exceeds 24 hours as there are no direct flights. At a time when he is busy analyzing opponents and checking players, the number of things that coach Kim needs to pay attention to continues to increase.