Anything but boring

South Koreans excited about third-place game vs. Turkey

Updated: Friday June 28, 2002 07:47 a.m. ET

GYEONGJU, South Korea (AP) -- They turn up everywhere -- student fans who wave national flags, hold handwritten "I love you!" messages and play a hide-and-seek game with police who try to flush them from hotel corridors and elevators.

It's the same outside the hotel where South Korea's World Cup team is staying. Fans shout the names of their favorite players until well past midnight, then start all over again on Friday at daybreak.

Three days after South Korea lost 1-0 to Germany in the semifinals, South Koreans' love for their team has hardly cooled. It will be the same when Guus Hiddink's side plays Saturday for third place against Turkey in Daegu, a central Korean city.

Hiddink knows about third-place games.

He led the Netherlands to the semifinals four years ago in France, where his team lost to Brazil on penalties. Croatia then defeated the Dutch for third place with striker Davor Suker scoring his sixth goal to seal the golden boot.

"It was not a nice experience. The game was under-motivated on both sides," Hiddink said. "It was just a game to play and go home afterward. ... I don't think that in these circumstances here, it will be the same game.

"We are obliged. The players feel that they should bring to the public, to the fans in and outside the stadium, a good performance one more time," he said. "I don't think it will be a boring third-place final."

For millions of South Korean fans, Saturday's match will be a "little final." On match day, police expect huge crowds of red-clad fans to fill streets and plazas in Seoul again as if their "Red Devils" were playing in the real final. Koreas are hoping for what they call "the beauty of a meaningful end."

"After their semifinal matches, I think both South Korea and Turkey are tired physically and psychologically," said Korean forward Ahn Jung-hwan. "But the match on Saturday will be tight and combative. We see a big difference between being third and being fourth."

By becoming the first Asian side to reach the World Cup semifinals and outshining co-host Japan, which was eliminated in the second round, South Korea has achieved much more than it expected.

The winning run has been a huge morale boost for South Koreans, who have long had an inferiority complex from being squeezed between China and Japan, which throughout history have invaded and subjugated Korea.

South Korea had never won a match in its five previous trips to the World Cup finals. This year, it tied with the United States but downed Poland, Portugal, Italy and Spain to reach the semifinals.

"They (fans) did a very big job in helping us," Hiddink said. "It's not a miracle; it's just a big, big achievement. ... Korean people can be very proud of what the team has achieved. Korea is not a little nation any more."

Turkey is also fired by an impressive showing in only its second World Cup final. Turkey lost 1-0 to Brazil on Wednesday in the other semifinal.

Turkey's last and only other appearance in the World Cup finals was in 1954, the year South Korea also made its debut at the tournament. Turkey gave South Korea a 7-0 drubbing, but few South Koreans harbor bitter feelings, largely because Turkish troops fought and died for South Korea during the three-year Korean War that ended in 1951.