Korea beat China to open East Asian football tournament at home

Korea's Lee Dong‑gyeong of takes a shot during an East Asian Football Federation (EAFF) E‑1 Championship match against China at Yongin Mireu Stadium in Yongin, Gyeonggi Province, Monday. Yonhap

The host country Korea handled China 3-0 to open an East Asian men's football tournament Monday.

Lee Dong-gyeong, Joo Min-kyu and Kim Ju-sung scored a goal apiece as Korea kicked off the East Asian Football Federation (EAFF) E-1 Football Championship with a comfortable win on this sultry night at Yongin Mireu Stadium in Yongin, some 40 kilometers south of Seoul.

Korea, world No. 23, improved to 24 wins, 13 draws and two losses against 94th-ranked China before a sparse crowd of 4,426 fans.

This is the 10th edition of the E-1 Championship, which began in 2003. The Taegeuk Warriors have won five titles, most recently in 2019.

Korea will next play Hong Kong at 8 p.m. Friday, and then Japan at 7:24 p.m. on July 15, both at Yongin Mireu Stadium. The team with the most points after the round-robin play will be the champions.

The EAFF event isn't on the FIFA international match calendar and teams here assembled their squads mostly with players from their domestic leagues or other Asian circuits.

For Korea, head coach Hong Myung-bo picked 23 players from the domestic K League 1 and three from the J1 League in Japan.

Hong also put together a youthful squad with little prior international exposure. Including second-half substitutes, six players made their senior national team debut Monday.