March 1, 2023
These diaries made a very brief review on South Korea’s K2 league in May 2020 when the country became one of the first countries to come out of the Covid lockdowns.
The K-League is celebrating its 40th anniversary and today saw the start of the 2023 K2 season with newly relegated Seongnam FC starting their campaign against Ansan Greeners. This will be the last season whereby there is no relegation from the K2 league, which is scheduled to start from 2024. This season, the K2 league has expanded from 11 sides to 13 sides, although the promotion of two sides from K3 was based on criteria other than performance on the pitch, with Cheonan City ( 10th place ) and Cheongju FC ( 14th ) being promoted ahead of champions Changwon City.
The 13 teams will play a regular 36 game season with the top side being automatically promoted to the K-League, and sides 2-5 featuring in the promotion play-offs.
The K-Leagues have a rule whereby in order to make 5 substitutions sides have to name an South Korean Under 22 player in their starting line-up and another on the bench. Amongst the five changes, one must be the Under 22 player coming on. If not, only three substitutions are permitted. However, as the Asian Under 20 competition is currently being staged, sides with two players selected for the South Korea squad are exempt from this rule for the duration of South Korea’s participation in that competition, and Seongnam are one of the beneficiaries as they have two players in the national Under 20 squad.
Ansan Greeners finished 9th in the 2022 K2 with an 8-13-19 record. Known as the Green Wolves, they play in the 35,000 capacity Ansan Wa Stadium, although their average attendance in 2022 was only 1,156.
Ansan is located 30km south of the capital Seoul and is connected to the city by the subway line 4 railway.
Ansan had two foreigners named in their squad at the start of the season, both who could politely be described as Brazilian journeymen. 26 year old winger Gabriel has had numerous clubs without appearing to have played more than 10 times for any of them, and 22 year old midfielder Wandrew. Of their local players, striker Keun-ho Lee has previously played for Pohang Steelers, Jeonbuk and Sangmu and was a substitute today. The Greeners were in a tasteful predominantly all white kit for today’s match, although their home kit is all pale green.
Seongnam finished bottom of the 2022 K-League with a 6-7-20 record to be 9 points adrift of 11th place, with an average home attendance of 1,778, although this was affected by ongoing Covid restrictions which no longer applies this year.
When these diaries covered the first week of the 2020 K-League season, Seongnam were 2-0 winners at Gwangju thanks to two goals from striker Yang Dong Hyan, who is now playing for Suwon FC. Impressive that day was left-back In-Soo Yu, who is now with Gangwon, whilst Uzbek centre-back Jamshid Iskanderov is now back in his home country with Navbahor Namangan.
Seongnam have won the K-League 7 times, although their last success was back in 2006. Home is the compact 16,146 capacity Tancheon Stadium which has a grass pitch and a running track. Their first choice colours are all black with nice white collars, hence they have The Magpies as their nickname.
Their squad for this season currently has just the one overseas player, Australian centre-back Patrick Flottmann, who had previously played for Sydney FC and Brisbane Roar in the A-League, but wasn’t in their squad today.
One notable South Korean player in their line-up was ex-Jeonbuk and Ulsan striker Jung-Ho Lee, who has two caps.
Seongnam is 20km south-east of Seoul, so Ansan faced a 30km journey for today’s match. The weather at the 16.00 local kick-off time was sunny but windy, and 9 degrees.
Today’s match was available to watch live on the tv.kleague.com website and Bet365.com, who made Seongnam 13/20 favourites, with Ansan 7/2 outsiders and the draw at 11/4
The hard-core home fanatics, mostly youthful, were congregated on a temporary low stand on the running track behind one of the goals. Bearing a banner with the words “Black List”, they were nearly all dressed in black, and many of them were standing. The other stands looked to be sparsely populated, and there were 20 or so Greeners supporters in the away end.
The pitch had a tinge of brown to it, and it looked firm. There were also signs of ticker-tape paper at the end where the home fans were, so perhaps the best team on paper would win ! The numbers on the back of both sides’ shirts were large, which at least made the identification of the players easier than usual !
The first shot on goal occurred in the 5th minute from Seongnam, when Jae-Won Lee took a quick throw-in enabling Jung Ho Lee to turn and produce a first-time left-footed snap-shot from just outside the area, forcing the Ansan keeper into a sprawling, diving save to push the ball away and then gather. Three minutes later JH Lee played a short pass to put left-back Ji-Won Park clear, but Greeners’ keeper Lee came off his line to narrow the angle and blocked the shot with his chest.
The home side appealed for a penalty when Sang Hyeok Park’s effort struck Jae-sung Kim but it appeared to hit the Ansan player’s body rather than his arm. The resulting in-swinging corner from Dong-woon Shum was met by centre-back Sung-Wook Jo, rising above Yu-sub Jang to head home from inside the 6 yard box to give Seongnam the lead with 11 minutes played. It was a deserved lead, rewarding a confident start to the game by the home side.
Ansan won their first corner in the 14th minute, but it was The Magpies who continued to hold the upper hand, with Shim firing just wide after a spell of pressure and Jo’s ambitious attempt to add his second goal flew a couple of feet over the bar from 30 yards.
Ansan were slowly getting a foothold into the game, as both sides were playing neat, passing football on the deck but Yong-Hee Jung needed to produce a timely header to deflect Sang-min Lee’s dangerous looking cross away for a corner.
As the first half entered added on time, the under pressure Ansan keeper punched away a corner from under his own bar, and the Greeners launched a swift counter attack. Yong Hee Jung played an incisive pass for Bum-su Kim to run on to in the Seongnam area only for centre-back Kang’s late tackle to bring him down for an obvious penalty. Debutant Gabriel, who bears a passing resemblance to Mesut Ozil, confidently side footed left-footed past the home keeper to make it all square at the break. There wasn’t even time for Seongnam to restart.
The first opportunity of the second period fell to Ansan, but having won a free-kick 25 yards out Yeong-nam Kim’s effort sailed harmlessly high and wide. The game’s comedy moment occurred in the 58th minute when after Sang-min Lee’s chip forward, both Seongnam striker Jung Ho Lee and the Ansan keeper hesitated and backed-off before the keeper eventually claimed the ball. Lee probably failed to anticipate the spin of the ball would be in his favour and only reacted when it was too late. Three minutes later Greeners wasted a 3 vs 3 when Kyung-jun Kim blazed wildly wide.
One nice feature of the game in South Korea is that the players bow to their coach and the crowd when they are replaced.
In the 70th minute Gabriel attempted an ambitious overhead kick to a cross from the left by-line but completely missed the ball. After an entertaining half with plenty of technical skill, the flow of the game was then interrupted by a succession of fouls and injuries which required treatment, resulting in 7 extra minutes being added.
With 75 minutes played the Ansan off-side trap caught 5 players off-side at a free-kick, and although Sung-Wook Jo slotted home, it was rightly chalked off. Ansan substitute Keun-ho Lee then had to go off injured, before Gabriel’s shot from the edge of the area was deflected inches wide with the home keeper stranded.
As the game approached its conclusion, play became ended to end. With 4 minutes remaining Seongnam substitute Shin’s 30 yarder slid just wide then Ansan’s Jung shot into the side netting. The home side piled on the pressure but Ji-Won Park could only fire straight at the keeper from 10 yards with the rebound being hacked away for a corner.
In the 7th minute of added on time, Seongnam grabbed the winning goal. Sang-hyeok Park’s in-swinging corner was met by Shin who headed home for a remarkably similar goal to Seongnam’s first goal.
However, the referee still alowed another 3 minutes to play, and it was Ansan’s turn to press. The ball fell to Jin Hyun Kim 8 yards out but a desperate block by Sang-min Lee resulted in the ball trickling wide of the post. Jae-sung Kim then did well to make space from a throw-in to get a cross from the right by-line but the unmarked Jae-min Jeong could only head wide. The final whistle blew shortly thereafter and the home fans could celebrate three points.
Highlights : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LjtfZDQbpyM
Seongnam FC : PS Choi – JW Lee, SW Jo, EB Kang, JW Park – SM Lee – DW Shim ( WJ Kim ), CJ Moon ( YG Jang ), SH Park, HM Jung ( JW Shin ) – JH Lee ( SS Jeon )
Ansan Greeners : HS Lee – YS Jang, YN Kim, JS Yoo – JS Kim, JH Kim, HG Lee ( JY Jeong ), YH Jung – Gabriel, KJ Kim ( KH Lee, JM Jeong ), BS Kim
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