The rise of Hong Hyun-seok (KAA Gent), who is active in the Belgian Jupiler League, is unusual. Hong Hyun-seok scored the opening goal in the 9th minute of the first half in the 24th round home game against league leader Genk, which was held on February 6 (Korean time). His team, Hent, unfortunately lost 2-3, but Hong Hyun-seok scored the highest score in the team with an average rating of 8.1 from ‘Foot Mob’, a soccer statistics site.
Ahead of this season, Hong Hyun-seok, who transferred from LASK Linz (Austria) to Ghent for a transfer fee of 1.5 million dollars (1.9 billion won), soared to 4 million euros (5.541 billion won) as of last November. Among Korean players, players with a higher transfer market value than Hong Hyun-seok are national team ace Son Heung-min (Tottenham), Kim Min-jae (Napoli) who captured Serie A, Hwang Hee-chan (Wolverhampton) who recently suffered an injury in peak form, and left-footed player who is aiming for the summer transfer market. There are only Lee Kang-in (Mallorca), who is a master of the game, Jung Woo-yeong (Freiburg), who is the same age as Hong Hyun-seok, and Hwang Eui-jo, who was recently loaned to FC Seoul.
The reason Hong Hyun-seok’s value skyrocketed is because he showed off his presence. Hong Hyun-seok played 21 league games this season, scoring 5 goals and 3 assists, scoring 2 goals in the Belgian Cup, and scoring 1 goal and 2 assists in the Europa Conference League. The season total was 8 goals and 5 assists in 32 appearances. In Gent, which is ranked 5th in the Jupiler League, the only player who has scored more goals than Hong Hyun-seok this season is team ace Hugo Kuipers. Kuipers, 3rd in league scoring, has scored 17 goals in 33 games this season, including 13 league goals, leading the team’s 5th place promotion along with Hong Hyun-seok and Laurent Deportre.
The Belgian First Division ranks eighth in the UEFA European League rankings. The Belgian League is next to the four big leagues we commonly know, England, Spain, Germany, Italy, and France represented by PSG, and the Netherlands and Portugal, which are the gateways for promising players. The Scottish league, which belongs to Celtic, which Oh Hyun-kyu joined a while ago, ranks ninth after Belgium. A player who played a key role in the Belgian first division, especially in the upper-middle-level teams, can expect to advance to the big leagues as the next step.
If you look at the winter transfer market that closed a while ago, you can predict Hong Hyun-seok’s next move to some extent. Onuachu (Nigeria, 28), who had been leading the scorer with 16 goals in front-runner Genk, moved to Southampton in the Premier League. And he made his Premier League debut in the match against Brentford in the 22nd round of the Premier League. In addition, striker Michael Frey, who scored 7 goals in 3rd place Antwerp, is on loan to Schalke, which is at the bottom of the Bundesliga, defender Eder Ballanta of 4th place Club Bruges is also for Schalke, striker Larryn is for Valladolid in the Spanish Primera Liga, and defender Sobol is for Strasbourg in the French Ligue 1. moved to 메이저사이트
In addition, Hong Hyun-seok’s teammates also headed to a higher league through the winter transfer market. 21-year-old striker Ibrahim Saleh (3 goals in 14 league games) left for Rennes in Ligue 1, midfielder Elisha Ousu (9 league games) for Ligue 1 Auxerre, and defender Schjolberg (8 league games) for Mainz in the Bundesliga. For Hong Hyun-seok, whose average rating for the season based on the foot mob is 7.39 points, which is 16th in the entire league, if he continues his current performance, he can head to a higher league at any time during the upcoming summer transfer window or later.
Heung-Min Son, Min-Jae Kim, Hee-Chan Hwang, Kang-In Lee, and Woo-Young Jung are not active in the big leagues, but Hyun-Seok Hong is raising his value more silently than anyone else. Now that he is only 23 years old, let’s look forward to his future.