Ahn Ik-soo reveals why he left Bjorn Johnson off the roster.
FC Seoul will host the Pohang Steelers in the 25th round of the Hana OneQ K League 1 2023 at 7:30 p.m. on April 4 at Seoul World Cup Stadium. Seoul is in third place in the league with 10 wins, seven draws and seven losses (37 points), while Pohang is in second place with 12 wins, eight draws and four losses (44 points).
Kim Shin-jin, Na Sang-ho, Palosevic, Willian, Osmar, Ki Sung-yong, Park Soo-il, Lee Han-beom, Kim Joo-seong, Kim Jin-ya, and Baek Jong-beom will start for the home team. On the bench will be Choi Chul-won, Lee Tae-seok, Hwang Hyun-soo, Lee Seung-mo, Han Seung-kyu, Kim Sang-hyeop, and Kim Kyung-min.
Speaking ahead of the match, Ahn Ik-soo said, “There are not many matches left, so all the teams will be thinking the same thing. Doing our best in every game is the goal and the way to go,” said Ahn, expressing his determination for the remaining matches.
Seoul’s roster did not include new signings Bjorn Johnson and Ilyuchenko. “It’s not a special situation,” said Ahn Ik-soo. “It’s not a special circumstance,” Ahn explained, “it’s just a matter of planning to play a good game according to the opponent’s style.
He also talked about training directly with Bjorn Johnson. “I played my last match around May 15-16. I’ve only been doing individual workouts. It can be seen as wasted time, and I feel like I have a role and responsibility to get that time back. It was a short period of time, but I think he wanted to be together. I’ve been training normally, but I’m adjusting to the team because I’ve been alone a lot. It’s a time to get to know each other. We’ve been training together and I’ve been in good shape.”
During the break, Palošević came on against Atletico Madrid and even scored a goal. “I made a joke,” Ahn said. I asked him why he was doing so well in front of Simeone, making tackles and working so hard, but not in our team (laughs), and he said, ‘It’s not that, it’s the situation’. He said, ‘It’s not the situation, it’s the intuition of the game.’ They’re a textbook example of the world’s best offense, and when someone says, ‘I’m going to send the ball there,’ Kari sends it somewhere unexpected, and that’s the difference.”
The team also draws inspiration from watching European teams in preseason. “I watched Arsenal and Barcelona play in the preseason. Arsenal’s striker is Jesus. We brought Bjorn Johnson, but Japan has a J-League where they get sponsors and we have to change the time of the game at the request of the broadcasters,” he said.
“We played Japan in winter training and the style of play is the same in the first and third division. They seem to have the motivation to make the fans go crazy and not think about anything else for a second. I think that’s the way we need to go, to keep surprising them. Someone told me that after watching Jeonbuk Hyundai and Paris Saint-Germain (PSG), they said that one team was playing Korean soccer and the other team was playing European soccer. Jeonbuk got down and played soccer, and this is the Korean sentiment. The Japanese team kept pressing forward against Bayern Munich. They pursue their own colors and find problems in them,” he added.안전놀이터
He added, “As a coach, you have to do that, but it’s disappointing. There are only a few games left. I think we need to think about policies and systems for tomorrow. We know the direction, but various factors seem to be holding us back.”