The Koreans celebrate scoring against Poland. (Allsport)

By David Anderson, PA Sport, Busan

Click here to place your World Cup bets!
Click here for South Korea team section
Click here for teams index
Click here for latest World Cup headlines
Click here for World Cup photo gallery
Click here for World Cup Bettingzone

Sweat - that is how Dutchman Guus Hiddink communicates with his South Korean players.

Hiddink claims his players follow his lead when they see him sweating as he works on the training pitch.

"By sweating is how I communicate," said the Korea coach. "If I sweat, they also want to sweat because they have an enormous ambition to work hard.

"I do work through an interpreter, but I must say in the last month or two my English has been getting worse because I have been talking two or three words in Korean to explain my principles to them. Just enough so they understand what I want from them."

This combination of perspiration and pidgin Korean certainly works and the former Holland coach gained footballing immortality in the eyes of Koreans when he guided the country to their first ever World Cup win over Poland. It is almost impossible to overstate just what this means to Korea, who have been jealous of co-hosts Japan's past achievements on the World Cup stage.

Korean fans, known as the Red Devils, partied well into the small hours and drove round Busan in lorries, waving the national flag and sounding their horns.

Even before his landmark success, Koreans had been falling over themselves to associate themselves with Hiddink, hoping that some of his magic dust might rub off on them.

Business leaders have been saying Hiddink's style of management should be the model for all Korean chief executives, while the two main political parties have also been trading on his name in the build-up to next week's local elections.

He was even overwhelmingly voted the most desirable husband material by contestants in the recent Miss Korea competition.

Hiddink says the players are the ones who deserve the credit. He praised them for being quick learners and he said they have made great progress over the last three or four months since they have been working together full-time.

"I think they've changed a lot in the last four months," he said. "I'm working with them now full-time since the start of January and February.

"I'm now working with them like a club, two or three times daily and I think that's a big change.

"I think when you see them play now compared to when you saw them play four or five months ago, it makes me proud.

"Their one outstanding ability is they learn very fast. They've proved that not just against Poland, but in the past few weeks against some very strong European teams.

"It was a tough road for them, but I think it was the only way to go in a short period to make them competitive in the World Cup and not just participants."

Hiddink, who can boast spells in charge of Real Madrid and Valencia on his CV, claims managing Korea compares to the satisfaction he got from leading Holland at France 98.

"I reunited the Dutch team for France and I worked with a lot of stars in that team," he said.

"We did well in France and that gave me a lot of pleasure seeing that team and it was a team of experience."

By contrast, these Korean players have come from nowhere, but they're so ambitious and willing to learn fast.

"They don't have the same big names, but in a short period they have become very competitive and that gives me a lot of satisfaction as a professional."

Koreans now feel Hiddink can lead them to a last 16-place for the first time, but he is refusing to look further ahead than Monday's game against the United States.

"We have achieved one victory and for many people that is enough," he said. "For me the team must be greedy and go and win the next game. I hope they will play with the same attitude and we will see what the next game brings.

"But this isn't just about this World Cup, but also the World Cup after. This team is young and I think we can go further."