South Korea coach praises injured winger Yang Hyun-jun as personal MVP despite limited playing time

By Yoo Jee-ho

TOYOTA, Japan, Oct. 4 (Yonhap) -- When asked to pick his personal MVP for South Korea in their run to the men's football gold medal at the Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games on Saturday, head coach Lee Min-sung chose a player who did not even take the field in the final.

"Everyone has been great but if I had to pick one player, it would have to be Yang Hyun-jun," Lee said of the Celtic FC winger who was limited to only one match for South Korea due to injury. "Although he only played in one match here, he sacrificed himself so much behind the scenes," Lee said. "I think it helped the guys on the pitch a great deal."

Yang, 24, recorded an assist during South Korea's 4-1 victory over Qatar in their first group stage match on Sept. 15. But he aggravated his hamstring injury then and went on to miss the next four matches for Lee's side.

And it was curious for the coach to single out Yang as his best player, when another attacker Eom Ji-sung of Swansea City led the tournament with four goals and four assists and scored the lone goal in South Korea's 1-0 win over Japan in the final at Toyota Stadium in Toyota, some 30 kilometers east of Nagoya.

When informed of the coach's remarks, Yang said Lee might have given him credit for being a mentor for younger teammates, such as his roommate Yang Min-hyeok.

The Asian Games men's football tournament is for players under the age of 23, with each nation allowed to select a maximum three players over that limit. Yang Hyun-jun was one of those over-age players, while Yang Min-hyeok, at 20, was the team's second-youngest player.

The younger Yang arrived in Japan with his confidence running low, the older Yang said, because he had not established himself with his Belgian club, Westerlo, despite some hype around his potential. Yang Min-hyeok signed with Tottenham Hotspur as a teenager in July 2024 but has yet to play with the Premier League club, having instead had loan spells with four different teams.

"Min-hyeok was going through a difficult time, and when he was thrust into action after I got hurt, he was putting a lot of pressure on himself," Yang Hyun-jun said. "I tried to do whatever I could to help him stay focused on the match at hand and not worry about anything else, and I think the coach acknowledged that."

Yang Hyun-jun said the players had been assigned roommates prior to the tournament, but once the team traveled to Toyota earlier in the week for Saturday's final, the players were free to choose their new roommate. Hyun-jun chose Min-hyeok.

"I could see that he beat himself up for every mistake he made on the pitch, and I told him he did not have to be so hard on himself," Yang Hyun-jun said. "I reminded him that he just has to stay consistent. He is a smart guy and he understood everything. All I did was to tell him a few words."

Yang Min-hyeok played a key role in Saturday's victory, as he assisted Eom's winning goal. With some hard-nosed play, Yang stripped defender Mihiro Sato of the ball on the right flank and drove hard down the line before sending a cross toward the goalmouth. The ball went off the hand of the goalkeeper Rui Araki and found its way to Eom, who got a left-footed shot off as he fell to the pitch.

"I was so proud of him," Yang Hyun-jun said of his roommate. "He is a gifted player. I think he felt pressure to live up to expectations when Tottenham signed him early, but I think he was able to put those things out of his mind and stay locked in on the match in the final. I was so happy to see that."

Yang Hyun-jun said he knew after the first match that he would not be healthy enough to play the rest of the tournament. He tried to make up for his absence by acting as the proverbial glue guy.

"Since I could not help the team on the pitch, I tried to bring guys together off the field," he said. "Some of us playing in Europe joined the national team late, and there was some sense early on that we were not really together as a team. So I tried to talk to the guys about life outside football and get them on the same page."

Yang then added with a smile, "I bought them coffee whenever I could."