Ki Sung-yueng shares why he’s retired from international football

Follow us on Google Discover

Newcastle United’s Ki Sung-yueng has retired from international football.

Newcastle United midfielder Ki Sung-yueng has admitted to the Daily Mail that he’s retired from international duty because he’s lost his place at St James’ Park.

Ki, 30, joined Newcastle on a free transfer from Swansea City last summer, though he only really started to become a regular under Rafael Benitez in November.

The experienced midfielder was really impressing in the middle of the park, but then headed off to the Asian Cup after the December draw with Fulham.

Ki played just twice for South Korea at the Asian Cup having picked up a hamstring injury, and has now returned to find that his role in the midfield has been taken.

Isaac Hayden and Sean Longstaff have starred in the Newcastle midfield, stepping up in the absences of Ki, Jonjo Shelvey and Mohamed Diame.

Ki has now retired from international football, and he admitted that he took this drastic measure in order to get his place back at Newcastle – and ultimately keep it.

Ki noted that he has lost his place on a number of occasions over the course of his career due to jetting off with South Korea, and he’s now decided it’s time to focus on Newcastle.

The ex-Celtic man added that he thinks Longstaff has ‘quality’, and now wants to get back up to full fitness in order to try and reclaim his place in Benitez’s Newcastle side.

“It’s time for me to concentrate on Newcastle,” said Ki. “I have played a lot of games for Korea and travelled back and forth for 10 years or so. That is difficult, such as this time. You are playing well in the team and have to leave. By the time you come back, someone else has your place. That has happened a lot of times in my career because of the national team.”

“I have seen Sean in training, I knew he had quality. We have very good competition now. For me, I have to wait for my chance again. First of all, I need to be as fit as before. I need to do extra training. I had to do this in the first period of the season, wait and work hard, and I will do it again,” he added.