The revelation of Park Joo-ho, a former member of the Korea Football Association’s power enhancement committee, is heating up the soccer community day after day. The KFA has been silent about “anonymous officials” but is blaming only Park Joo-ho, a real-name official.
Coach Hong Myung-bo has been appointed as the head coach of the Korean men’s national soccer team, which has been vacant for about five months. On the 7th, the Korea Football Association said it has appointed Ulsan HD coach Hong Myung-bo as the next coach of the national team. In a briefing conducted by Lee Im-saeng, general director of the Korea Football Association’s technical headquarters, who was responsible for the appointment of the national team coach instead of former chairman of the Korea Power Reinforcement Committee, on the 8th, the specific contract period of “2027 Asian Cup” came out, and Hong’s appointment was virtually confirmed. The specific timing of the appointment is in the process of coordination.
Many had to express their doubts. Lee said in a briefing that he had a meeting with Gus Foyet in Madrid, Spain on Thursday and then with Davit Wagner in Frankfurt, Germany on Thursday. After returning to Korea on Thursday, he met with Hong at around 11 p.m. in front of Hong’s home where the match against Suwon FC was held, and was informed of Hong’s acceptance on the next morning. Considering realistic time, it is doubtful whether Hong, like a foreign coach, went through sufficient presentation process and whether there was a process to verify again how well he conforms to the technological philosophy announced by the Korea Football Association.
During the briefing, Lee cited eight reasons for appointing Hong: ▲ A game model that conforms to the national team’s philosophy ▲ Leadership ▲ Finding outstanding players in the K-League, checking players’ conditions, and linking them by age ▲ Performance of a domestic coach who outpaces foreign leaders ▲ Lack of time for a foreign coach to identify Korean players at the time the third qualifying round begins ▲ Experience in coaching the national team is very important ▲ Lack of time to apply firm philosophy of foreign candidates to Korea ▲ Risk of re-enactment of controversy at home. Excluding game model, leadership, and experience in coaching the national team, all of them were close to the reason why it was difficult to select a foreign coach, not Hong. It is also questionable whether Hong’s soccer matches the national team’s philosophy and game model.
In this situation, on the 8th, former member Park released a video revealing the internal situation of the National Power Enhancement Committee through his YouTube channel. He explained what kind of timeline the committee has gone through so far, and he also talked about why a foreign coach who was close to being appointed like coach Jesse Mashi was not finally selected. During the filming, he looked vain when news of Hong’s appointment as the national team, which he did not know, was announced.
유흥알바 The Korea Football Association soon expressed deep regret over Park’s revelation. “We express serious concern and regret over the situation in which Park distorted the activities of the power reinforcement committee and the process of appointing a director through videos on social media (SNS) from arbitrary perspectives,” he said on his official website on the 9th. “As these words and actions disparage the efforts of many members except himself, it seems necessary to apologize and explain to the members of the power reinforcement committee who have worked together for the past five months first,” he said. “We will carefully review whether there are any violations of the regulations and proceed with necessary measures.” There were also reports that he considered legal action against Park who did not abide by the confidentiality agreement.
However, a confidentiality agreement has never been observed in the past five months. The unnamed officials have conveyed for granted stories about the Korea Electric Power Corp. (KCC) and the Korea Football Association to the outside world. Numerous news reports thus far provide confirmation of the facts. Consequently, it is also not reasonable to conclude that the former was far wrong among the anonymous officials who leaked the details of the meeting during the appointment of Park and her manager, which interfered with the process of appointing the coach.
The reason why director Lee pushed for the appointment of a director unilaterally this time was because of precedents that were not kept confidential. Director Lee said in a briefing, “After meeting director Hong and making a decision, I had to reconvene the committee members to have a meeting, but if I had a meeting again, I was afraid to go to the media or outside. So I decided with the consent of the five members whether I should make a final decision individually.” It was based on fear and distrust that even Hong’s nomination could be leaked to the outside world, not on director Hong.
In the end, it can be inferred that the reason why the Korea Football Association announced a strong response to Park was because it talked about it against the Korea Football Association. However, it seems difficult to take legal action against Park, who puts public interest ahead of private interests, and if Park should be punished by a confidentiality agreement, the Korea Football Association should conduct a full investigation into who the anonymous officials have come out so far.
It was hard to say that the KFA’s actions in the process of appointing the national team coach for five months after the dismissal of coach Jurgen Klinsmann were satisfactory. It is doubtful how fair procedures were followed in the process of appointing Hong. On top of that, the KFA’s swift response to Park’s disclosure is making the entire process of appointing the national team a skit.
