Selection of national team manager (2024)
Between February and July 2024,the men's national team had no full-time manager after Jürgen Klinsmann was fired. Two domestic managers had been temporarily filling in during that period. Selection committee head Jung Hae-seong abruptly resigned just days before Ulsan HD manager Hong Myung-bo was announced as the new national team manager. As the appointment took place in the middle of the K League season,fans and sports journalists and pundits were highly critical while irate Ulsan fans started holding up banners saying "Get out!" directed at Hong and protested in front of the KFA's headquarters. [7]
Selection committee member and football commentator Park Joo-ho was threatened with legal action by the KFA over a video he had uploaded on his YouTube channel on 8 July. He had been filming with fellow commentator Kim Hwan to discuss the KFA's lack of progress in selecting a new national team coach over the past five months and had reacted with surprise regarding the real-time news of Hong Myung-bo's appointment as the new manager. After that,he explained his reaction and further reiterated the fact he had no knowledge of the appointment despite being part of the committee responsible for the selection of coaches and his frustration with the disorganized nature of the selection process. The reaction was not edited out and the full video was uploaded,garnering several million views. [8] Park refused to retract his claims of cronyism and disorganized leadership at the very top of the KFA management hierarchy. Koo Ja-cheol was among the active players who publicly defended Park on his social media account. [9] Hong's 2002 World Cup teammates Kim Nam-il and Ahn Jung-hwan,who had been silent on the issue until then,both corroborated Park's claims and noted that it had been going since the 2002 World Cup. [10] [11]
After the massive public outcry from already disgruntled fans and more former players,the KFA stated that it would not pursue legal action against Park but the incident led to the Ministry of Culture,Sports and Tourism (MCST) conducting an independent probe by the Sports Ethics Center and scheduling an inquiry. [12] [13] Park eventually resigned from his position and joined football commentator Park Moon-sung in testifying before an inquiry at the National Assembly that September. [14] There were differences between MCST's findings and Park's contentions. The findings revealed that Hong and David Wagner received the most votes from members of the selection committee including Park,and that the members agreed to give the final say to Jung Hae-seong. [15] On the contrary,the MCST pointed out that KFA president Chung Mong-gyu's attempt to overturn Hong's appointment was the violation of procedure. Jung Hae-seong had recommended Hong to president Chung and immediately resigned from the committee after the president rejected the recommendation. [16] The president,who preferred foreign managers to domestic managers,arbitrarily authorized Lee Lim-saeng to negotiate with candidates,but Lee reached the same conclusion as Jung Hae-seong. [17]
Nonetheless,public opinion of the KFA deteriorated further following revelations that the organization issued delayed responses to or failed to advocate for Europe-based players regarding the repeated racist abuse they received,with journalists and fans noting the stark contrast to the immediate and strongly-worded statement released in response to Park's YouTube video. [18] [19]
