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Choi Yong-soo (Yonhap News) |
FC Seoul head coach Choi Yong-soo in the top South Korean league has been named the top coach of 2013 in Asia.
The K League Classic bench boss earned the Coach of the Year award at the annual Asian Football Confederation (AFC) awards ceremony in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, late Tuesday. He became the sixth South Korean coach to win the honor since the award was first presented in 1994, and the second straight after Kim Ho-gon of another K League Classic club, Ulsan Hyundai.
This year, Choi's FC Seoul made its first appearance in the final of the AFC Championship League, the top annual club competition in the continent, where it bowed out to Guangzhou Evergrande of China.
Only coaches of Asian descent were eligible for the award, which ruled out Marcello Lippi, the World Cup-winning coach for Guangzhou from Italy.
Choi beat out fellow South Korean Jong Song-chon, who coached South Korea to first place at the AFC U-19 Women's Championship, and Iraq's Hakeem Shakir, who led his country to a runner-up finish at the AFC U-19 Championship.
There were other South Korean winners in Malaysia on Tuesday aside from Choi.
Jang Sel-gi, striker for the U-19 women's national team, was named female AFC Youth Player of the Year. She scored a tournament-leading eight goals in five matches to help South Korea win the 2013 AFC U-19 Championship and was named the event's most valuable player.
Jang is the second South Korean to earn the distinction after Yeo Min-ji in 2010.
The U-19 women's team was named the Women's National Team of the Year, becoming the first women's team from South Korea of any age group to win the award.
Chung Mong-joon, former FIFA vice president and current honorary president of the Korea Football Association (KFA), received the AFC Diamond of Asia, the confederation's achievement award.
Other South Korean candidates came up short in their categories. FC Seoul's captain Ha Dae-sung lost out to Zheng Zhi of Guangzhou Evergrande for the AFC Player of the Year award. Son Heung-min, a youngster for Bayer Leverkusen in Germany's Bundesliga, was up for the Asian International Player of the Year award, for the top Asian playing overseas, but Yuto Nagamoto of Japan, playing for Inter Milan in Italy, was the winner.
FC Seoul's striker Dejan Damjanovic, who's from Montenegro, was shortlisted for the AFC Foreign Player of the Year honors, but Muriqui of Brazil, striker for Guangzhou Evergrande, took home the trophy. (Yonhap News)
