A Chorus of Mustangs – Lower-league Soccer in Korea
Although the sports scene in Korea is more or less dominated by baseball most people are aware that Koreans also have a keen interest in football (or soccer depending on which side of the Atlantic you call home) and a relatively popular professional league of a good standard – the K-League. Few, if any, Koreans let alone expats however will be aware that there are, in fact, 4 leagues in the Korean football setup.
K-League Classic is the top of the tree and features the likes of FC Seoul and Suwon Samsung Bluewings while the second-tier K-League Challenge is home to a number of smaller teams such as FC Anyang and Bucheon 1995. The third level is the National League which is run as a separate organisation to the K-League and features semi-pro and company teams like Busan Transport Corporation and Ulsan Mipo Dockyard. At the bottom of the heap is the Challengers League – where the players mostly compete for a few thousand won and the love of the game.
Today was the first game of the Challengers League Playoff – where the top 6 team from the regular season compete for the Championship title – and two games were taking place. In Icheon, Icheon Citizen were taking on Chuncheon while my game of choice was at Jungnang Public Sports Ground where the wonderfully named Jungnang Chorus Mustang were hosting Paju Citizen.
Finding the ground was easy enough – take the subway to Yangwon on the Jungnang Line and come out of Exit 2 and turn left past the camping ground. You will come across the pitch on your right after about 5 minutes of walking. At this level the stadia are little more than public parks so don’t expect anything too salubrious. It’s a far cry from the glitz and glamour of the English Premiership – this is all about mud and thunder. Except in this case their was no mud because not only was it a rather nice day but the pitch was also artificial turf. Looking at the rather sparse protection offered by the roof over the seating area I was hoping there would be no thunder either.
Given the level of competition, there seemed to be a fairly big turnout at the game (a good couple of hundred anyway) and a fairly decent atmosphere with fans of both sides getting behind their teams and the guys on the park doing their best to respond. None of these guys were going to worry Lionel Messi but they were playing their hearts out for the team and standard on display was reasonably good.
Off the pitch, you couldn’t have hoped for better surroundings with the sun coming out to light up the red, golds and browns of the autumn leaves on the surrounding countryside. One of the best parts of following Korean football at this level is going to place you might otherwise never have seen and I was glad I made the trip for this one.
The game itself ended 2-1 to Paju Citizen following a somewhat soft free-kick which Paju converted in extra-time to seal the victory. Cue the celebrations for the Paju team and tears for the Mustangs. Seeing the emotion of the players and coach at the end was a touching reminder of what football is really about far away from the multi-millionaires playing at the elite level.
The playoffs continue throughout November so there’s plenty of opportunity to take in a game before the curtain comes down on the season.