Even the European team that could not play failed to be selected… The Football Association’s administrative power is also on the chopping block.

One of the reasons for Hwang Seon-hong’s ‘disaster’ of failing to participate in the Olympics for the first time in 40 years is the weakening of power due to the failure of European players to be selected. This is because Bae Jun-ho (Stoke City), Yang Hyun-jun (Celtic), and Kim Ji-soo (Brentford) all failed to participate in the 2024 Asian Football Confederation (AFC) Under-23 Asian Cup due to rejection by their teams.

Previously, coach Hwang Seon-hong included four European players in the final entry of 23 players announced before the tournament, but only Kim Min-woo (Düsseldorf) joined properly, and the remaining three were reported to have been ‘not selected’ one after another. Every time the selection for a European team fell through, a replacement player who had been staying in Korea had to rush to Qatar, the site of the final match. Naturally, full-body training had to be delayed accordingly.

Considering Bae Jun-ho and Yang Hyun-jun’s position in their teams, it was somewhat inevitable that it would be difficult to be selected. In the case of Bae Jun-ho, who is currently playing as Stoke City’s ace, after not being selected for the national team, he continued to play a key role in his team and eventually led the team to remain in the second division. Yang Hyun-jun also started in the FA Cup semifinals held on the 20th and helped the team advance to the finals, and is also continuing the fierce competition to win the league.

However, the situation of ‘European center back’ Kim Ji-su is somewhat different from the previous ones. Of course, Kim Ji-soo’s team, Brentford, is also engaged in a fierce competition for survival, to the extent that it was recently confirmed to remain in the English Premier League (EPL), but this is because Kim Ji-soo’s position is not as strong as Bae Jun-ho or Yang Hyun-jun.

In fact, Jisoo Kim was not only excluded from the entry list for the EPL round 35 away game against Everton held on the 28th, but he has not yet made his official EPL debut. Earlier this month, he was listed as a substitute on the list, but the fact that he did not get a chance to play meant that his position in the team was not strong.

Kim Ji-soo’s failure to be selected is bound to remain even more disappointing, coupled with the fact that center back power leakage was serious in the 2024 AFC U-23 Asian Cup. When Kim Ji-su’s selection fell through, coach Hwang Seon-hong selected a midfielder instead of a replacement center back. There were only three professional center backs participating in this tournament: Byun Jun-su (Gwangju FC), Myung-gwan Seo (Bucheon FC), and Lee Jae-won (Cheonan City).

The problem was that Seo Myung-kwan fell off his horse due to injury in the second game of the last group stage, and Byun Jun-soo also received a second yellow card and missed the third game against Japan. Coach Hwang’s temporary solution of using defensive midfielder Lee Kang-hee (Gyeongnam FC) and fullback Cho Hyun-taek (Gimcheon Sangmu) as a back three was effective, but he used the same tactic in the quarterfinals against Indonesia, and eventually the defensive organization collapsed and the team failed. ‘Disaster’ could not be avoided. Hwang Seon-hong had always been preparing for the Olympic qualifiers with a 4-back strategy, but he actually used a 3-back strategy for the games against Korea and Japan and Indonesia.

On his return to Korea via Incheon International Airport on the 27th, coach Hwang Seon-hong said, “I personally visited the club and was promised a call-up (to a European team), but the teams refused the call-up as the battle for rankings intensified at the end of the season.” He added, “(Kim Ji-soo’s) replacement player. “There are criticisms that a central defender was not selected, but there is currently no player in the country that can be selected as a central defender,” he explained. In the end, in a situation where there is a shortage of center back resources for players under the age of 23, even recruiting a European center back who cannot play for his team failed.

Coach Hwang Seon-hong tried his best to get permission by personally traveling to Europe and contacting the club. Even after completing the training camp in Turkiye early this year, he did not return home immediately but instead headed straight to Europe to negotiate with each club. The fact that he personally negotiated with clubs in Europe was something that Coach Hwang had emphasized several times in interviews.

Naturally, while the Olympic team coaches, including coach Hwang Seon-hong, are making efforts to recruit European players, criticism is bound to arise as to whether the ‘administrative power’ of the Korea Football Association has been sufficiently supported. As a result, unlike Korea, where only one member joined, Australia had 6 Europeans, and Japan had 5 Europeans, showing a significant difference in the basic proportion of Europeans. The fact that the Japan Football Association is known to have dispatched employees other than the national team coaching staff to receive permission from clubs to be called up was also a point of significant comparison with Korea, where coach Hwang Seon-hong had to take action himself.

Of course, the prevailing view was that it would not be easy for Bae Jun-ho and Yang Hyun-jun to be selected due to the circumstances of their teams. However, it is natural that the fact that Kim Ji-soo, who cannot play for his team, was not even allowed to be called up led to criticism that the Korea Football Association was not able to exercise its administrative power as much as it should. In addition to the issue of recruiting European teams, there are also voices saying that the Football Association viewed advancing to the Olympics as a given and did not even have much interest in the AFC U-23 Asian Cup.

Immediately after being eliminated from the Olympics, the Football Association said, “We are well aware that the Korea Football Association has overall responsibility for nurturing and supporting the national football team, so we once again bow our heads in apology,” and added, “We are closely examining the system for nurturing players and leaders and managing the national team.” “We will find ways to improve and ensure that failures like today are no longer repeated,” he said. I should have prepared properly a long time ago, but I only made up my mind after experiencing the tragedy of not being able to participate in the Olympics for the first time in 40 years.