The South Korean men’s national soccer team will gather on the weekend in preparation for an upcoming pre-World Cup friendly match against Greece.The 22-man squad, coached by Hong Myung-bo, will report to the National Football Center in Paju, Gyeonggi Province, north of Seoul, on Saturday. The team will then depart for Athens the following day. The match is scheduled for Wednesday.Hong has called up players based in European leagues for this game. In three earlier matches held between late Janua

LONDON (AP) ― After a gloomy start to 2014 for English Premier League teams in Europe, Tottenham achieved what five rivals failed to do ― win.Arsenal, Manchester United and Manchester City all opened the Champions League knockout phase with first-leg losses, while Chelsea drew. But on Thursday, hours after Swansea was knocked out of the Europa League, Tottenham overturned a 1-0 deficit against Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk to win 3-1 at White Hart Lane and advance to the round of 16.Roman Zozulya headed

GELSENKIRCHEN, Germany (AP) ― With an overwhelming offensive display, Real Madrid became the first road team to score six goals in a knockout-stage game of the Champions League and put itself in position for its fourth straight trip to the quarterfinals.Cristiano Ronaldo, Gareth Bale and Karim Benzema scored two goals each Wednesday night in a 6-1 rout of Schalke in the first leg of its second-round matchup.“We played a very, very good match,” Madrid coach Carlo Ancelotti said. “We got well into

FC Seoul made an emphatic start to the ACL, scoring in each half to beat a lackluster Central Coast Mariners 2-0 in the opening round of group play. In a night that featured five draws from the eight matches played, 2013 runner-up Seoul provided the most dominant performance. Defender Osmar converted a penalty in the 33rd minute to give the lead over the Australian side. (AP)

City remains three points back with a game in hand

FLORIANOPOLIS, Brazil (AP) ― FIFA says it is concerned about security challenges during the World Cup in Brazil but isn’t afraid of being targeted by public demonstrations expected in June. “FIFA is not coming now with less people. Instead, we are increasing our staff during the World Cup, obviously, and we are not hiding our brand,” director of security Ralf Mutschke said on Thursday. “FIFA is not feeling as a target and we are not hiding ourselves or our symbol. We are proud to be here and to

RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) ― For Brazilians, not winning the World Cup would be bad enough.Even worse would be rival Argentina winning in Brazil where 200 million locals are expecting to celebrate.“This would be every Brazilians worst nightmare,” said Newton Cesar Santos, the Brazilian author of a 600-page history of the Brazil-Argentina rivalry ― Brazil X Argentina: Stories of the Biggest Classic in World Football.“Let anybody win, but not Argentina.”There are many intense soccer matchups: Netherlands

MANCHESTER, England (AP) ― Manchester City powered forward with ease into the FA Cup quarterfinals on Saturday, overcoming Premier League title rival Chelsea 2-0 to maintain its quadruple chase.Stevan Jovetic and Samir Nasri provided the goals to avenge a 1-0 league loss this month, with a formidable City in complete control and preventing Chelsea from hitting the target once.“We can beat everyone,” Jovetic said. “We learnt something (from losing to Chelsea), you could see that on the pitch.”Alt

INCHEON (Yonhap) ― Park Ji-sung, former captain of the South Korean men’s national soccer team, will not come out of his international retirement to play in the upcoming FIFA World Cup in Brazil, the team’s head coach said Friday.Hong Myung-bo, who will lead South Korea to its eighth consecutive trip to the World Cup this summer, said Park told him he will not come out of international retirement for one last hurrah.“I had a heart-to-heart with Park Ji-sung,” Hong told reporters at Incheon Inter

Korea dropped out of the top 60 in FIFA rankings for the first time in nearly two decades.According to the February ranking unveiled by FIFA on Thursday, South Korea slipped eight spots to No. 61.South Korea has lost its last two international matches: 4-0 to Mexico on Jan. 29 and then 2-0 to the United States on Feb. 1.Among member nations of the Asian Football Confederation (AFC), South Korea is trailing five countries: Iran (38th), Japan (50th), Australia (53rd), Uzbekistan (57th) and the Uni