South Korea coach Huh Jung-Moo believes his team rose to the occasion against Uruguay on Saturday, and were unlucky to be beaten.

GettyImagesHuh Jung-Moo saw his team beaten 2-1 by Uruguay on Saturday.

Huh saw his side suffer a 2-1 defeat in Port Elizabeth, with Luis Suarez scoring a stunning goal to seal Uruguay's win.

"My players never gave up," Huh said. "They were tenacious and rose to the challenge, they showed they were true Koreans."

He went on to say Uruguay were fortunate to beat his team, and that South Korea struggled to match the quality of Oscar Tabarez's side.

"We wanted to go into the quarter-finals," he said. "We had lots of chances. Uruguay were lucky enough to score, we lost because we weren't able to match them."