The Final Evaluation Match
“One, two! One, two!”
The familiar Korean voice rang out across the unfamiliar foreign soil of Austria. Given that it was only about a week before the World Cup, the tone carried a sharp military discipline. Especially the voices of the players running near Senior Seo-hee were particularly loud.
Of course, I was adding my own strength to those voices as well.
Once the warm-up level physical training ended, the simple tactical training without physical expenditure marked the end of today’s session.
Of course, that didn’t mean all schedules were complete.
“After dinner, gather in the meeting room by 13:30!”
The reason today’s training ended so simply was to prepare for tomorrow’s match.
Tomorrow’s opponent was immediately Colombia from Group H. Colombia needed a practice opponent to prepare against Japan in the same group, and we needed to practice against a Central or South American nation similar to Mexico.
Although technically East Asian, Japan was technical while we were physical (excluding me, of course), and unlike Mexico full of dwarves, Colombia’s center-backs were all around 190cm tall. So there was some mismatch as opposing teams, but it was important to feel the atmosphere.
Excluding that, considering after the group stage, Colombia was a decent practice opponent. South American teams had always been Korea’s weakness, and if we advanced as second place, we’d face the Group E first place, which was likely Brazil. So we had to think of them as practice.
Of course, advancing through the group stage wasn’t easy. In my previous life, no matter how hard I tried, the South Korean national team had the ‘South American phobia’ gene in its DNA. Well, Mexico was maybe Central American at best.
Anyway, Mexico had the DNA for the round of 16, and Germany, likely to top the group, was a strong team.
In my previous life, there was a time when I beat Germany at the World Cup around this time and it was a hot topic, but since the world had changed, Germany wasn’t the ‘rusty tank army’ from before, so the possibility of reaching the round of 16 was low.
Well, we’ll see when we face them.
“Since this evaluation match is being held privately, even if we lose, no one will scold you. So, think of it as facing Mexico instead of Colombia, and show the tactics we’ve practiced so far. Can you all do it?”
At the meeting time, we reviewed the tactics for facing Mexico again while preparing for the Colombia match.
The most important thing in the Mexico match was using Yang Hyun-hee’s head and my play.
The tactics we prepared against Mexico were essentially a 4-4-1-1 formation, and the coach gave me infinite freedom in the attacking midfielder position.
Some might say it’s too irresponsible for a 16-year-old, but actually, no matter who the coach was, it was more threatening to the opponent if I thought and played alone than if the coach gave tactical instructions. So, if it’s pre-roll, it was always welcome.
“And, Colombia’s center-backs are all top-tier center-backs playing in the EPL, so even if our strategy doesn’t work, there’s no need to worry. Mexico’s center-backs will be smaller than Colombia’s players. We just need to confirm the process of crossing. Remember this, and let’s play well tomorrow.”
So the coach emphasized until the end that we were facing Mexico, not Colombia, and we were able to finish today’s schedule early.
“...Ha-neul, can you come see me for a moment?”
But my personal schedule didn’t end.
“Yes, senior.”
“While I had free time, I reviewed it again... Honestly, even though FM is a well-made game, there were some shortcomings when I actually played against it? So I tried tweaking it a bit...”
'Sigh, senior is doing this again... And the free time, what, I saw you sitting in a corner on the plane with a laptop.'
It was because of the ‘tactical research meeting’ with Senior Seo-hee.
Of course, before departure, I had promised to do well for Senior Seo-hee, so after eating dinner, I spent the day with Senior Seo-hee having ‘tactical research time’.
After such a fulfilling day, the Colombia match came.
Since it was a private evaluation match, there were no spectators, but since it was officially approved as an A-match by FIFA, the game started with regular referees, and we started moving as prepared.
Colombia, like a South American team, attacked our sides at a fast pace. The right side with Park Hye-ri playing for Mainz was not easily broken through and blocked Colombia’s attack somehow, but the left side was not.
On the left fullback of the national team, there were two players: Kim Min-seo playing for Suwon and Kim Yu-jin playing for Pohang. Among them, Kim Min-seo, who was good at crossing and selected as starter for the Mexico match.
But like most fullbacks, being good at crossing doesn’t mean good at defending.
Actually, that’s the nature of the fullback position.
They might not have the talent to attack, but those who started football as wing forwards or wingers, or those who started as center-backs when young but couldn’t grow physically to play center-back, generally move to the side. The national team players were the same.
Without asking, Kim Min-seo was probably the former type, and Kim Yu-jin the latter.
Anyway, once we realized the left side with Kim Min-seo was weak, Colombia focused on attacking the left, and we eventually conceded a goal to Colombia’s penetrating play.
'This doesn’t change...'
The truth that doesn’t change even if the world changes. Isn’t it that the South Korean national team is weak against South American teams?
If I could, I wanted to keep trying to break through and score goals, but this was practice for the real game anyway. I suppressed my desire to break through and kept crossing to Yang Hyun-hee. In games similar to this practice, I had to show as many crosses as possible so that Yang Hyun-hee could perform well in the real game.
Of course, if there were spectators coming to watch our game this time, I wouldn’t have been able to control myself because I wanted to feel the thrill, but since there were no spectators, I was able to suppress my inner desires.
“Kabi! Kabi! It’s okay!”
“Sorry...”
“Hey, it’s practice. And if you do it now, you’ll do well against Mexico too.”
Unfortunately, the results were not great. The 180cm early Mexico center-backs and the around 190cm Colombia center-backs were on different dimensions.
Still, as I kept crossing, Yang Hyun-hee, who had adapted to my crosses, gradually started heading the ball, and I distributed the ball to other players, creating crossing chances.
“Good, keep it up. We conceded a goal but don’t worry about it. It’s meaningless anyway. Just do what we practiced!”
When the first half ended, the score was 1:0, but the coach seemed quite satisfied with his tactics working as planned.
'Well, if it were Mexico defenders, at least one goal would have been scored...'
And the second half began. The second half also developed similarly. We created as many crosses as possible, and Yang Hyun-hee jumped towards the ball as if she were a basketball player. After about 70 minutes, Yang Hyun-hee left and Kim Seul-gi came in.
Yang Hyun-hee’s heading offense was eating away at the center-backs’ stamina, and Kim Seul-gi, the hexagonal striker, was attacking the defenders with reduced stamina, which was the basic principle of our tactic.
And since Kim Seul-gi came in, I didn’t have to worry about crossing anymore.
“Block! Block!”
As I dribbled in, I heard Colombian players shouting something. During the game, I lightly beat one and crossed from a free-kick state, so it was natural for the Colombian players to overreact to my every movement.
But I couldn’t block me.
I lightly touched one with my upper body feint and ran forward.
Due to the body contact with Yang Hyun-hee throughout the game, the opponent player chased me slower than usual. And thanks to that distance difference, the defender in front rolled his body towards me.
'Here...'
Tap.
I lightly touched the ball to Kim Seul-gi. And Kim Seul-gi connected my pass to the goal as if showing the dignity of a starting attacking midfielder in an EPL mid-table team.
'Is this 1:1?'
“Ha-neul, good pass.”
“Senior, good shot too.”
“Haha, if our team members passed like you, we would have scored 20 goals.”
“Hey, then they would have come to Barcelona.”
“... Ha-neul?”
“N-no, I’m joking.”
“Hahaha. Anyway, well done.”
...There was a small accident where I couldn’t maintain the concept for a moment due to the game’s excitement, but it wasn’t that important, and the coach, upon tying, substituted me and Kim Min-seo out and showed defensive mercenary tactics. It was a defensive practice assuming a large score difference with 10-20 minutes left.
With our space defense, we were able to end the evaluation match against Colombia 1:1.
“Good job!”
“Good job!”
“Good work. Everyone. You played well today, and if we go like this, it won’t be that difficult against Mexico either.”
As the coach said, if we go like this, the Mexico match won’t be that difficult. With my breakthrough added to that.
Well, the cross tactic towards Yang Hyun-hee was possible because I was there with crosses almost perfect, but anyway.
Anyway, after the evaluation match against Colombia, we had a satisfactory result, so after light recovery training, we entered training again, and a few days later, we could play a private evaluation match against Poland.
The Poland match was set for Sweden in the first half and Germany in the second half. In the first half where we went aggressively, I scored one goal making it 1:0, and in the second half using defensive counterattack tactics, we conceded one goal, and the Poland match ended 1:1.
I’ve felt it from before, but in counterattack situations, what could I do? At best, just providing a pass to create a chance, but today, the positioning of Kim Seul-gi at the front didn’t match well, so I had to accept a disappointing result.
“...Then, everyone, good work. Thank you for coming without getting injured. Now we’re going to Russia. Have a time without regrets.”
After finishing all the evaluation matches with draws, we left Austria, the training location, and headed to Russia, where the World Cup was held.