YOUTH: U.S. U-20 result at Suwon Tournament
The U.S. U-20 national team fell 1-0 to host South Korea on a freezing cold evening at the Suwon World Cup Stadium in their second match of the Suwon International Tournament.
The loss ended Coach Sigi Schmid's streak of eight straight wins since he took over the team last fall. Schmid started only two players –Hunter Freeman and Greg Dalby — from the team that beat Argentina, 2-1, in the opening game in Suwon.
It was the first international cap for Cal State Northridge defender Sean Franklin as he started at right back, while UC Irvine's Brad Evans got his first international start after notching his first cap against Argentina.
ôWe played with a much different lineup than we did in our first game and we struggled a bit tonight,ö said Schmid. ôKorea is a good team. They play with a lot of energy and they make the field small defensively at the right times. We needed to use this trip to look at players, so while we are disappointed that we lost that is something that we accomplished.ö á The U.S. will next face Egypt, which fell to Argentina, 4-0, in the other match. The U-20s were drawn with Egypt, Argentina and West Germany in the first round of the 2005 World Youth Championship.
March 24 in Suwon
South Korea 1 USA 0. Goal: Lee Y.R. 43.
South Korea — Jung S.R., Park H.C., Lee Y.H., Jung I.W., Lee J.G., Hwang, Baek, Lee Y.R. (Boo, 88), On (Park J.J., 84), Lee G.H. (Lee S.H., 82), Shin.
USA — Kartunen, Freeman (Ward), Rogers, Sturgis, Franklin (John, 88), Kljestan (Gaven, 46), Dalby (Capt.), Szetela (Feilhaber, 76), Hill (Peterson, 69), Evans (Barrett, 60), Alvarez.