The Ansan Greeners, the second division of the professional soccer K League 2, were in confusion, with 20% of the team suddenly being replaced without a plan after the new general manager was established.
According to the soccer community on the 23rd, Ansan's preparation for the next season seemed to be going smoothly when the final game of the 2024 season was played against Seongnam FC on the 9th of last month.
The K League 2 of the 2025 season will play the first round on February 22-23, about a week earlier than usual, so we had to prepare for the season quickly.
In particular, Ansan's speed match was more important because as many as 31 out of 35 players became free agents.
Fortunately, Song Kyung-seop, who has a reputation for finding promising players in Ansan, is in charge of the U-18 coach.
Head coach Song and front-runners went around the country to find good players. "Some people had a hard time getting IVs," an official said.
Ansan had a hard time last year, with then leaders on the prosecution's investigation list due to corruption in player selection.
With this opportunity, the method of selecting players has become transparent. In order to sign a contract with a player, the decision has been made to go through a resolution of the player enhancement committee, which is set up by the Ansan Sports Promotion Division, the first team coach, and the front desk.
As a result, 30 players have been selected to play for the Ansan adult team next season at the Player Enhancement Committee held on the 28th of last month.
Based on these 30 players, the blueprint that Ansan coach Lee Kwan-woo was drawing was almost blank when new general manager Kim Jung-taek took office on the 19th.
General manager Kim showed a list of 12 players he had selected and ordered them to be included in the 30-member squad.
In fact, it was an order to overturn the decision of the player reinforcement committee, and the coaches and front offices protested.
After a flurry of complacency, a "non-agreement agreement" was reached to send out six of the 30 people already selected, and to recruit eight of the general manager Kim's list to form a team of 32 players.
Players who are on the verge of losing a team to play next season are strongly opposed.
One of the six is veteran striker Kang Soo-il from a multicultural family.
Although he is 37 years old, he is considered to be still competitive as a K League 2 Joker because he takes good care of his body.
In addition, he, who came from a multicultural family, has established himself as a player representing the Ansan club due to the nature of his connection with many foreign migrants, but is in a position to be forced to retire due to the sudden failure of his contract renewal.
Fullback Lim Ji-min, who played several games for the K League 1 Daegu FC B team last season, also had quite a lot of expectations, but he was unable to sign with Ansan for reasons unrelated to his skills.
The other four players are more serious.
Four players, high school seniors, did not apply to college from time to time because they were confirmed to join Ansan.
If the contract fails as it is, he will have to spend a year as a jobless man next year. After that, it will be even more problematic.
One year immediately after graduation from high school is the most important period as a soccer player. It would be difficult to find a team that can take a player who spent this period off the field.
All six of them did not sign the contract, but took all the steps leading up to the contract. Lim and the four high school graduates passed the team's player enhancement committee, completed salary negotiations and medical tests, and had been conducting team training for two to three weeks.
"A Better Tomorrow Than Today," the general manager of the Ansan Supporters' Solidarity, issued a statement urging the team to quickly form a team based on the recruitment list prepared by existing coaches Lee Kwan-woo and Song Kyung-seop, not the recruitment list of general manager Kim Jung-taek.
The group also pointed out that Kim, known as a close aide to Ansan Mayor Lee Min-geun, was appointed as the team's general manager for political purposes, stressing, "All of this raises serious concerns that the club is privatizing it for political purposes or personal greed."
General manager Kim has been the chairman of the Ansan Football Association, but he is a politician with no experience in professional team administration.
Since 2010, he has served three terms as a member of the Grand National Party, the Saenuri Party, and the Liberty Korea Party, and is known to have helped Mayor Lee in the election.
The back-and-forth of administration under the influence of the heads of local governments is a chronic malaise of the city and provincial teams, which are now taken for granted.
However, as in the Ansan case, it is difficult to find an unprecedented case for the team to be replaced as soon as the high-ranking team changes.
This is why the soccer community points out that "even if you do it, it's too much."
Players such as Lim Ji-min, who failed to sign a contract, plan to act in solidarity by sending an official letter of protest to Mayor Lee and the club, arguing that the contract was not successful, and reporting it to the Korea 안전놀이터 Professional Football Federation's Clean Center.