The Paraguayan soccer team visits the South Korean team this Thursday (07:00) in Suwon with the need to change the pale image it left at the beginning of its long road to the 2026 World Cup.
Demanding thoroughly and, why not, beat a rival that is ready for the World Cup in Qatar, is the mission of the pupils of the Argentine coach Guillermo Barros Schelotto, who were overwhelmed last Thursday with a 4-1 by Japan , another country qualified for the Qatar World Cup.
La Albirroja, who failed in the South American qualifiers for the 2022 World Cup, today completed a week of preparation in Asia in search of a new era for the project.
“We are putting together our team, for us it is very good to compete against teams that are going to be in the World Cup and start to see what the dynamics are, the level and start competing,” said the coach.
“We are going to try to play an intelligent game and compete with them, we are also going to try to get a good result”, he added.
THE RIVAL
South Korea has just suffered a 1-5 win against Brazil and achieved a 2-0 victory against debutant Eduardo Berizzo’s Chile team, announced last night through his coach, the Portuguese Paulo Bento, that midfielder Jung Woo -young, one of the regulars with the Asian team, will be absent against Paraguay.
“He’s not going to play tomorrow. We’ll see which player replaces him in tomorrow’s game,” Bento said at a press conference when asked about the state of the Qatari Al Sadd midfielder, who trained this Thursday separately from the rest of the group.
“We’ll see if he can recover for the last game (the last friendly of this round between South Korea and Egypt on June 14),” said the Portuguese coach, who did not add details about the midfielder’s injury.
Jung, 32, has been a fixture for Paulo Bento since taking charge of the Taeguk Warriors in 2018.
Likewise, Bento will not be able to count on the winger Hwang Hee-chan, who scored the first goal against the ‘Red’ and who must finish these days of completing his mandatory military service.
Also doubtful is left-back Kim Jin-su, who has not been able to play any friendly in this series so far due to a hamstring injury.
The men coached by the Portuguese hope to correct the defensive mistakes made against both Brazil and Chile, which even with ten caused many problems for the Asians at the back, and it is likely that they will once again rely on quick transitions and long balls in search of of its main star and captain, Son Heung-min.
