National soccer team coach candidates narrowed to four

The Korea Football Association’s National Power Enhancement Committee has narrowed down the candidates for the next national team manager to 11, including four domestic coaches and seven overseas coaches.

“We held a meeting for more than three hours today with 32 candidates and decided to shortlist 11,” said Jeong Hae-sung, chairman of the committee, at a briefing at the Jongno-gu Football Hall in Seoul on Feb. 2. “We will immediately proceed with interviews with seven overseas coaches.”

The South Korean national soccer team was eliminated in the semifinals of the Asian Cup in Qatar last year, and coach Jürgen Klinsmann was sacked in February after infighting within the squad became apparent. Since then, a new committee has been formed under the chairmanship of Chung Jung-sung to find a new coach. Olympic coach Hwang Sun-hong took over as interim head coach for the two North and Central American World Cup qualifiers against Thailand last month.

The next A-match period is in June.

The final two matches of the second round of World Cup qualifying are away to Singapore on June 6 and at home against China on June 11.

“We are analyzing game footage of the candidates,” Chung said. For overseas coaches, we will first conduct virtual interviews, and if the results are good, 스포츠토토 we will conduct face-to-face interviews locally. We hope to appoint a head coach by early to mid-May,” said Chung.

Regarding Hwang, who took over as interim coach in March, Chung said, “He has a chance,” adding, “I watched the two games against Thailand and saw that he created a ‘one team’ in a short time, and the players naturally melted into it.” “The list of candidates also includes K League coaches and coaches from soccer associations,” he added.