‘Eight-footer’ Hwang In-beom (27, Tsubena Zvezda) carried out 100 percent of coach Jürgen Klinsmann’s (58) orders.
Klinsmann’s men defeated Singapore 5-0 on Saturday at 8 p.m. at the Seoul World Cup Stadium in the first match of the second Asian qualifying round for the FIFA Confederations Cup North America 2026.
With the win, South Korea topped Group C in the second round of qualifying and began their quest to qualify for their 11th consecutive World Cup in style. South Korea will now travel to Shenzhen, China, to face China in the second leg on June 21.
It was an easy win. South Korea had a few nervous moments, with a goal disallowed due to officiating and a string of bad luck in front of goal. However, a goal from Cho Kyu-sung in the last minute of the first half and a flurry of goals from Hwang Hee-chan, Son Heung-min, Hwang Eui-jo, and Lee Kang-in in the second half were enough to secure the victory.
Hwang In-beom also started and played the full 70 minutes to help his team to victory. The versatile midfielder played a relatively defensive role on the day, holding the midfield. He dropped in between the center backs to act as a link, and he was steady with his passes from front to back and left to right.
“It was really cold, but we won thanks to the fans who filled the stadium,” said Hwang In-beom in the post-match mixer. You could say we had a tough game because we didn’t score easily in the first half, but the players scored evenly in the second half, so we got a good result. Thank you to our fans,” he said after the victory.
- One-ball in the middle. What did Klinsmann ask you to do?
Coach Klinsmann knows that I’m more of an offensive player than a defensive player, so this time he told me to make sure that (Kim) Min-jae and (Jung) Seung-hyun make a good triangle between them and don’t go out. He also wanted me to receive the ball and make a transition play. I’m a player who likes to move without realizing it, so I kept thinking about it. I think Minjae and Seunghyun didn’t move that much because their brother controlled them well. 보스토토 주소
- It’s been a long time since I’ve played the No. 6 (defensive midfielder) role.
At my current team, the coach asks me to play in that position a lot, so I didn’t feel too awkward playing there. However, as I said before, it was different when I was playing in an offensive role as the No. 8, so I did a lot of image training before the game.
