K-League Gets Temperatures Rising Already

The winter was not a fierce one by Korean standards, except for one week in early February that saw Seoul temperatures plummet to minus 20, and the 2012 K-League certainly did not take long to warm up.

The excitement and controversy were getting going even before the big kick-off. 24 hours ahead of the opening game, Daejeon Citizen were in the headlines for letting veteran, and we are talking Dino Zoff style, goalkeeper Choi Eun-sung go.

It wasn’t that fans thought the 40 year-old who had been with the club since it came into existence in 1997 and was the third-choice ‘keeper at the 2002 World Cup, deserves an automatic starting place but the manner in which the club handled it angered almost all. The 40 year-old went on a pre-season tour of Mexico but learned that he wasn’t getting a contract on the week of season start.

Citizen fans planned a silent protest. They would go down to Gyeongnam FC for the opening game of the season but would not make a sound. In the end, it wasn’t that difficult. Amid driving rain and biting winds, the fans had little to shout about anyway as they lost 3-0 to the early table toppers.

The day earlier however, there was a little English Premier League style controversy as Seongnam Ilhwa Chunma defender Sasa Ognenovski refused to shake the hand of Jeonbuk Motors’ Brazilian playmaker Eninho before the game.



The two don’t get on. Basically The South American thinks the Australian plays too rough while the feeling coming the other way is that Eninho dives. The Brazilian had the last laugh however as he scored a late winner as the champions kicked off their defence with a 3-2 win.

Lee Dong-gook got the other two and in the process the Lion King, who had scored three goals in two games for the national team in the previous seven days including the opener in a vital 2-0 World Cup qualification win over Kuwait in midweek, set a new K-League goalscoring record with an 117th strike to move ahead of Woo Sung-yong.

Also on Saturday, Ulsan Horangi snatched a hard-fought 1-0 win at Pohang Steelers courtesy of giant striker Kim Shin-wook. If the Tigers can integrate their signings of fine attacking players – Lee Keun-ho and Kim Sung-yung from Gamba Osaka and Akihiro Ienega from Real Mallorca – and keep their usual defensive solidity then they will finish higher in the league than sixth.

If the handshake affair in Jeonju reminded of the Evra-Suarez incident in the English Premier League then in Daegu there was, a more tenuous link it has to be admitted, a kind of Carlos Tevez episode. OK, FC Seoul striker and 2011 top goalscorer Dejan Damjanovic did not refuse to come off the bench but the star striker did, according to coach Choi Yong-soo, refuse to play to his best and was subbed out after 22 minutes as Seoul drew 1-1 at Daegu.

The problem is that Seoul turned down a reported $5 million bid from Guangzhou R&F for the Montenegrin international. As you would expect, there would also be money to double Damjanovic’s salary and as you would expect the player was interested.

“His condition was OK ahead of the match. However, Dejan was not the player I am familiar with at all, so I took him off. Although he has conflicting interests with the club, he promised me (to play hard), but broke his word,” Choi told reporters. “I cannot forgive this. Despite the promise to me, he betrayed my and his teammates’ trust in him. I will not field him in future games if he does not change his attitude,” he said. “If we continue to show a solid performance like today, we will be able to achieve good results in the future despite the absence of Dejan.”

Seoul’s bitter rivals Suwon Bluewings fared better with a 1-0 win over Busan I’Park – a team that had a good season last year but were unable to stop bigger clubs taking their stars. It wasn’t a great performance from either team but Suwon’s new Australian defender Eddy Bosnar impressed as did Brazilian new boy Everton Cardosa Da Silva who scored the game’s only goal.

There are hopes that Incheon United can this season shed their usual mid-table status. 2002 World Cup heroes Kim Nam-il and Seol Ki-hyeon joined in the winter as did Australian international Nathan Burns. He was injured as United, led by Korea’s 2010 World Cup coach Huh Jung-moo, crashed to a 3-1 loss at Jeju United.

There weren’t many goals elsewhere. Last year’s bottom club Gangwon FC were delighted with a goalless draw at Chunnam Dragons while Gwangju FC got off to a good start with a 1-0 win at military club Sangju Sangmu.

This will be Sangju’s last season in the top tier. In the K-League’s 30th season, it has finally adopted relegation. Two teams will go down this season and as a non-professional entity, the army boys will be one of them. That is not all. Affter 30 games this season, the 16 teams will split, Scottish style, into two groups of eight that will play each other twice for the title and for the right to finish bottom.

That is a long way off. There are still 43 games to go.


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Korean Transfer Window Well And Truly Open

The turn of the year has seen the transfer market in the K-League gather momentum. Players and coaches have returned from their end of season vacations and teams are starting their winter training camps.

The first week of 2012 saw two big deals involving midfielders who may not be quite automatic starters for the national team but are never too far from the first eleven. That is certainly the case for Kim Jung-woo. The 29 year-old was a feature of the 2010 World Cup when the Taeguk Warriors made the second round in South Africa and has scored his sixth goal for the national team in Korea’s 6-0 win over Lebanon in qualification for the 2014 World Cup in September.

Kim has spent the last two seasons with Gwangju and then Sangju Sangmu, the league’s military team. He was one of the stars of the 2011 season, scoring 15 goals for a team that usually struggles. His return to Seongnam Ilhwa coincided with the end of his contract. Kim was perhaps the most highly sought after Korean player of the close season and was on the wishlist of a number of clubs but ended up with Jeonbuk Motors.

“I am overjoyed to join Jeonbuk, last year’s K-League winners and one of the most distinguished clubs in Asia” he said. “I will do my best to meet expectations and do my best for the image of Jeonbuk,” said the 29-year-old. “I have experience playing with (Jeonbuk’s) Lee Dong-gook and Kim Sang-sik at Seongnam. I think we will able to play well if we adjust together through communication. I have many good memories with the two at Seongnam.”

Seongnam fans will be consoled by the fact that the club has shelled out not far shy of $2 million to add Yoon Bitgaram to their squad. The midfielder is 21 and has already made 13 appearances for the national team. Glasgow Rangers had bid around $1.3 million for Yoon, who captained Korea’s team at the 2007 Under-17 World Cup and then spent a few weeks with Blackburn Rovers in England, but his club Gyeongnam preferred to sell him to Seongnam for a greater fee.

"We have signed Yoon Bitgaram to be part of our challenge to win the K-League and the 2012 AFC Champions League," Seongnam said in a statement. "Naturally, he will strengthen the team and help us increase our fan base."

Suwon Bluewings go through players at an alarming rate and have also been busy in the past weeks. The club said goodbye (again) to talismanic defender Mato Neretljak and replaced the tall Croatian with the even taller Australian in the shape of Eddy Bosnar. Bosnar has spent the last four plus seasons in Japan with JEF United and Shimizu S-Pulse.

Like Neretljak, he takes a mean free-kick but it remains to be seen if he can become as big a favourite with the fans. If he can’t be the new MAto, he’s hoping he can be the new Sasa Ognenovski who fought his way into the Australian national team after impressing in Korea for Seongnam.

"If the move goes ahead I think it gives me a good chance of getting back in the Socceroos picture," said Bosnar. "The facilities at Suwon are better than anything I have seen in Japan and it would give me a chance to play at a higher level."

Pohang Steelers have also been shopping overseas following the departure of Brazilian star Mota but have been doing business in Eastern Europe. Hwang Sun-hong led the team to second in the K-League in 2011 He has picked up former Romanian international Ianis Zicu and ex-Serbian U-21 defender Zoran Rendulic.

Zicu arrives from CSKA Sofia and has experience in Serie A with Parma while the big defender Rendulic has played in Austria and France.

“Zicu doesn’t just have UEFA Champions League and Romanian national team experience, we expect him to become an important part of our attack,” Hwang said. “Rendulic isn’t just a great defender, he can prove useful in attack too.”

“I wanted a new challenge so I decided to come to Pohang,” said Zicu. “I know that Pohang are Asia’s most prestigious team and I want to help the club challenge in the AFC Champions League again.”

2010 champions FC Seoul have been fairly quiet so far but it likely to change over the coming weeks while Ulsan Horangi, who made the final of the championship play-offs are also in the market for new players after losing out jeonbuk in the race for Kim.


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Out Of It Octet Already Thinking Of 2011

While much of the attention is understandably at the top end of the K-league as the end of the season approaches, those a little lower down the standings have issues of their own.

Seven of the 15 still have much to play for but the bottom eight are already thinking about next season. One has more to think about than most. Gwangju Sangmu FC is the league’s military club and gives the nation’s players a place to swap the khaki uniform for the orange soccer shirt during their two years of military service. The team usually struggles - it hasn’t won in the last 15 games - as would most teams if they couldn’t sign any new players and saw their entire personnel change every two years.

Sangmu’s contract with the southwestern city is coming to an end and as Gwangju will have its own team from 2011, a real soccer team, the army men are marching in search for a new base. It is proving difficult as cities that had previously been interested in welcoming the team such as Anyang, Ansan and Paju have had a change of heart.

Happier times look to be ahead for Incheon United. The west coast club is now under the control of Huh Jung-moo, the man who took South Korea to the second round of the 2010 World Cup. Since arriving in July, Huh has been frustrated and encouraged in equal measure. His new team have an infuriating habit of losing leads. A 3-0 lead against lowly Daejeon Citizen ended 3-3 and caused Huh to blast his players for “idiotic football”. With two minutes to go the week before last, United were 2-0 ahead over title-chasing Gyeongnam FC but ending up drawing 2-2.

Huh has been delighted with the form however of Yoo Byung-soo. The coach may have ignored the young striker for the World Cup but Yoo can’t stop scoring and will top the K-league’s chart by some distance. Keeping hold of the powerful attacker may be Huh’s greatest challenge over the next few months.

Of the teams in the lower reaches of the standings, the one looking around at unfamiliar company and wondering ‘where the hell are we?’ is Pohang Steelers. The Gyeongsang giants ended 2009 as Asian champions, for a record third time, and playing (and impressing) at FIFA’s Club World Cup. Soon after, Brazilian coach Sergio Farias was tempted away by the riches of Saudi Arabia’s Al Ahli.

He didn’t last long there but neither did his replacement in Korea, Waldermar Lemos. Pohang’s domestic form has been poor all season and while the team made it to the last eight of the continental competition, a chance of a fourth title was ended by Zob Ahan of Iran. The club has a temporary coach while it seeks a new guy ahead of next season. He will be Korean - and Busan I’Park coach Hwang Sun-hong is rumoured to be the favoured candidate.

Busan’s season has been reasonable for a club without much money. The former giant of Korean and Asian football flirted with the play-offs for a time but never really seemed serious about getting among the big boys.

The other names down the depths are familiar ones. Daegu FC and Daejeon Citizen are not able to sign the top players and struggle more often than not while Gangwon FC is in only its second season. The Gangneung/Chuncheon based club has enjoyed some good results but has been unable to gain any momentum.

Down in South Jeolla Province, Chunnam Dragons will be disappointed with 2010 after enjoying 2009. The Dragons has spent much of the season down the bottom and despite a team boasting the talents of Brazilians Adrian Chuva and Indio are already in off-season mode.

This time next week it will all be over for the also-rans as the top six commence the play-offs but then there is always next season.

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K-League Clubs Make History

Asian football history will be made this Wednesday with South Korea at the heart of it all. The Land of the Morning Calm is supplying 50% of the eight teams still involved in the Asian Champions League as the continental competition resumes at the quarterfinal stage after a break of four months.

Much has happened since the second round came to a close in May, not least the 2010 World Cup. Nothing like this, one nation supplying the maximum four teams possible, has happened before however.

East and South-East Asia supplied 16 of the 32 teams that started out in the competition back in February. The four teams each from Japan and China have fallen by the wayside as have representatives from Australia, Indonesia and Singapore. Only Korea remains as the K-League looks for a ninth championship and East Asia for a fifth in succession.

Now, with the final in sight, the continent is no longer split into east and west. After the group stage and the one-off match of the second round, the quarter and semi-finals are two-legged affairs.

Defending Asian champions Pohang Steelers and defending Korean champions Jeonbuk Motors will face long trips to West Asia over the next week. Not Seongnam Ilhwa or Suwon Bluewings though. Most eyes in Korea will be on the clash between the Gyeonggi giants who become the first all-Korean participants of an Asian tie since Jeonbuk and Ulsan met at the semi-final stage of the 2006 tournament.

It promises to be quite a clash, both at Seongnam’s Tancheon Stadium on Wednesday and in the second leg at Suwon World Cup Stadium a week later. A few months ago, Seongnam, would have been the overwhelming favorites to progress to the last four for the third time in seven years but much has changed over the summer.

To be more accurate, Suwon have changed. The team now bears little resemblance to the soporific and sluggish side that sank to the bottom of the K-League in the first half of the season. With loss after loss in the domestic game, coach Cha Bum-keun, regarded as the greatest Asian soccer player of the 20th century, called it a day in June.

His replacement Yoon Sung-hyo has, so far, been a revelation. Seven wins and two ties, a record marred only by last weekend’s loss at the hands of leaders Jeju United, have seen the Bluewings soar from bottom to seventh place in the league.
New signing Naohiro Takahara is starting to score and the former Japanese international in joined in attacked by the returning Shin Young-rok. With Kim Doo-hyun and Baek Ji-hoon looking like their former selves in midfield, Suwon fans are confident of upsetting Seongnam.

In Asian terms that would be something of a shock. Seongnam were much more impressive in the Champions League earlier this season and is still going well in the league with six wins from its last ten matches. Coach Shin Tae-yong is looking to become the first man to win the Asian Champions League as both coach and player after lifting the trophy with the same club back in 1996.

"Suwon has a strong forward and midfield line-up …and the team condition of Suwon looks very good and it is also playing well. But we don’t need to worry about this. We will prepare well and win.” said Shin to the official homepage of the Asian Football Confederation.

“Every K-League club has a keen desire to play in the Champions League. They want to win the prize money and they want to play in the FIFA Club World Cup. So they prepare a lot for the competition. I think this is the main reason why four K-League clubs could reach the last eight this year.”

Pohang Steelers won the competition last year for a record third time and despite the team’s poor form at home; they have made it into the last eight once again. The first leg is a long trek to the home of Iran’s league leaders Zob Ahan. It is the first time that the hosts have made it this far but after the Iranian national team won 1-0 in Seoul last week in an international friendly, Pohang will be taking nothing for granted.

The third Korean match sees Al Shabab of Saudi Arabia travel to Jeonju to face Jeonbuk Motors. It is the first West Asian opposition for the Greens since the final of the 2006 tournament in which they defeated Al Karama of Syria. Jeonbuk will be favorites to progress to the last four despite a poor showing last Friday as they lost 3-1 at home to Gangwon FC. Last, and for Koreans, least, is the all West Asian clash between Saudi Arabian powerhouse AL Hilal and Qatar's Al Gharafa.

Copyright: John Duerden & Soccerphile.com


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Korea 100% In Asia But Could Do Better

You can’t do much better than 100 percent. South Korea’s quartet of teams that started the 2010 Asian Champions League back in February have all survived the first round intact. China have lost at least three of theirs and it could be all four while Japan will see at least one and probably two fall by the wayside.

But in the Land of the Morning Calm, it has been a comfortable, stress-free progression. Pohang Steelers, Suwon Bluewings, Seongnam Ilhwa Chunma and Jeonbuk Motors are all through to the round of sixteen having played just five of the six group games.

It is an impressive achievement to see all four progress unscathed but actually, it could have been better. The top two teams from each of the eight groups progress to the knockout stage but not all are equal. Finishing in first place ensures that the one-off game in the next round is played at home. Finishing second means a journey elsewhere.

Seongnam is the best-placed and is already certain of a home tie. The Yellows can sit back and see who will finish first or second in Group G. At the moment, that is Suwon Bluewings. It remains to be seen if either team will welcome meeting such a familiar foe on the continental stage. The local media certainly will.

Suwon’s players are kicking themselves that they are not currently occupying top spot instead of Gamba Osaka. In last week’s match in Japan, Suwon was level at 1-1 with seconds remaining until the defenders somehow let Gamba’s 17 year-old striker Takashi Usami score the decisive goal. The 2-1 win puts the J-League team in pole position.

"I thought we were heading home with one point in our hand,” lamented Suwon coach Cha Bum-keun who is lamenting often these days. “But our players seemed to have lost their concentration in the last part of the game. We gave up their first goal so easily and so soon after our first goal, and that hurt us. We want to play at home in the round of 16 but … that possibility seems to have become smaller.”

Suwon is a team that has been struggling of late with Asia being the only bright spot of what is becoming another dismal season at home. Three successive defeats in the K-League, including a painful 3-0 loss at the home of bitter rivals FC Seoul and a 2-1 defeat at home to Seongnam, preceded the Osaka disappointmen and then one followed. Unless the Japanese lose in China next week and Suwon defeat Singapore Armed Forces, Suwon will be making the short trip across Gyeonggi Province.

Jeonbuk Motors is another team that is likely to finish second after conceding a last-minute goal to a Japanese team. Kashima Antlers won 2-1 in Jeonju in March and the K-League champions have been playing catch-up ever since. Both are through to the last 16 but if Jeonbuk, who won the competition in 2006, want to play at home in the next round, it has to win at the home of the Japanese champion.

“We want to avenge the defeat in Kashima,” said Jeonbuk coach Choi Kang-hee after the match and added. “I know that is going to be a difficult away game but we will use the best of what we have to get a victory. I have plans for that.”

If Jeonbuk don’t manage to get the result in Ibaraki next week then a long trip to South Australia to take on Adelaide United is on the cards. But if things go differently, a game against Pohang Steelers and a Jeolla and Gyeongsang Province match-up is a distinct possibility. All four Korean teams playing each other in the round of sixteen would be something to see.

Copyright: Soccerphile.com & John Duerden



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South Korea Strikes Back Against China

It turns out that ‘Koreaphobia’ is a condition not easily cured. For South Korea and China, this week is the ‘decider’. The two neighbours have crossed swords twice this year already with the score resting at 1-1. Events over the next 48 hours will determine which nation emerges as the winner.

The Koreans have long had the upper hand when it comes to the beautiful game. In 32 meetings between the two national teams, China had never won. Such a woeful record gave rise to the pseudo-psychological condition that described the fear of playing Korea. It was a term coined in the Middle Kingdom but taken up with gusto in the Land of the Morning Calm.

That all changed on a February evening in Tokyo when China shocked the Asian Tigers with a 3-0 win. The result wasn’t flattering in the least and it could easily have been more.

The victory was the best moment for Chinese football since they reached the 2004 Asian Cup final. It was greeted with a hail of happy headlines on the west side of the Yellow Sea and provoked gloom, doom and much soul-searching over on the east. Only a 2-0 win over Ivory Coast a month later lightened the mood ahead of the World Cup - that and last week’s results.

The Asian Champions League reached the halfway stage and as it did so, Korea’s four representatives in the competition met China’s quartet. Each of the eight groups contains four teams with the top two progressing to the second round. It was a clean sweep for Korea as all four K-League teams triumphed against Chinese Super league opposition.

Seongnam Ilhwa Chunma started the week coming back from a goal down at home against the Chinese champion. Beijing Guoan took the lead in the first half due to former Scotland international Maurice Ross but the Yellows hit back with three goals in the final twelve minutes to win 3-1 and stay on course for the second round.

Two hours later, Suwon Bluewings recorded a vital 2-0 victory in the Chinese province of Henan to cement its place at the top of Group G. A similar result in Wednesday’s return match at Suwon World Cup Stadium will likely see Cha Bum-keun’s team reach the knockout stage.

If Korean players think the winter is dragging on at home then Jeonbuk Motors faced freezing conditions in northern China at the home of Changchun Yatai. Jeonbuk coach Choi Kang-hee wondered aloud if the host watered the freezing pitch overnight in order to turn it into an ‘ice rink’.

The charge was denied. It didn’t matter in the end as though Changchun took the lead midway through the second half, late goals from ‘The Prince’ Choi Tae-wook and ‘The Lion King' Lee Dong-gook gave the Motors an impressive win in a tough environment. Changchun visit Jeonju on Tuesday.

The fantastic fourth win came on a bitterly cold night in Pohang. The Pohang Steelers were not at their best but still squeezed past the challenge of Shandong Luneng to win 1-0. The visitor missed a late penalty to end a bad week for Chinese soccer.

Naturally, it was mentioned by more than one media source in Korea though there was a good deal of restraint showed. The Beijing media was a little depressed but there was at least some sense of perspective from leading newspaper Titan.

“Our four teams shouldn’t give up,” said Titan. In the ‘Korea vs. China Asian Championship Series’, we lost 4-0 although the national team won 3-0 last month. We know we couldn't catch up with Japanese and Korean football in one night time but there is a long way to run. Our clubs shouldn’t give up their Asian Champions League hopes. That would be a much bigger shame.”

“All four Chinese clubs lost their match in ACL in single matchday, it is the first time this has happened.” Said ‘Soccer’. “And they were all defeated by Korean rivals. We may have cured Koreaphobia in international matches for the first time in 32 years but the shameful results returned.”

Such sentiments could easily change over the next 48 hours.



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