Center back Choi Seok-hyun (Dankook University) has been named the best player on the South Korean U-20 team at the FIFA U-20 World Cup 2023 by an expert from a prestigious South American club.
Ahead of the 2023 U-20 World Cup quarterfinals, Mundial Scout released an interim report that analyzed the team’s performance through the quarterfinals. Of the five South Koreans they positively evaluated, Choi Seok-hyun was the first to be mentioned and was given the most space.
The Mundial Scout is an 11-person soccer talent scouting project across six countries led by analyst Felipe Araya, who spent his career at Brazilian Serie A side Santos. Santos produced superstars like the late Pele and Neymar (31-Paris Saint-Germain).
The ‘Mundial Scout’ report, written in French-Spanish-Portuguese-English, cited Choi’s strengths as ▲ header clearing in and around the penalty box that overcomes his height limit (178 cm) ▲ anticipation of the next play ▲ forward ability, which is also required of a central defender in modern football ▲ a center back who can penetrate directly into the midfield with the ball ▲ and filtering the risk of conceding goals. 토토사이트
Unlike other Korean professional players such as Lee Seung-won (Gangwon FC), Bae Seo-joon, and Bae Jun-ho (Daejeon Hana Citizen), who were born in 2003 and are one year younger, Choi received better praise even though he is still an amateur.
At the U-20 World Cup, Choi played full-time in all but the third match of the group stage, which he missed due to accumulating cautions, and helped South Korea reach the semifinals. His back-to-back goals in the 16-8 quarterfinals were the definition of a “goal-scoring defender.
Choi also had a goal and an assist at the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) U-20 Championship 2023. His physicality and ability to get involved in goals at the top of the center back line is reminiscent of Sergio Ramos (37-Spain).