Korean football - It’s a family affair

The beautiful game in Korea hasn’t yet been ruined by money; in fact there seems to be very little money in the game, with both ticket prices and attendances low there can’t be too much money for salaries.
Ticket prices are very reasonable indeed, around 4 pounds for a ticket, this keeps costs down and so it is very common to see entire families go. In fact the majority of the people who go to these games seem to be families, you can see sometimes see a few generations of the same family at the game all having a picnic of Korean treats and various alcoholic beverages. The fact that at some premiership grounds you can buy a watered down beer for about 3 quid and cant take it to your seat is bad enough but when you get to Korea and can quite easily take a carrier bag full of your own beer into the stadium with no hassle makes it all the worse, I'm not sure if its technically allowed but they don’t make a fuss and everyone does it.
You can actually buy food and drink inside the stadiums too and the costs are also kept right down here, its weird but it’s almost as if the food and drink stalls are there for the convenience of the spectators and not to extort money from usually working class fans. Football is an international language but there is no doubting you are in Korea when you go to get your half time pie and are faced with dried squid, various moulded meat on sticks or instant noodles!

Incidentally, I have recently read that the cost for fish and chips at the new Wembley stadium is around 8 pounds, a scandalous amount and the price fixers should be ashamed of themselves. This is twice the cost of a ticket for a K league game! I am ready to admit that the standard of football here is nowhere near the standard of the game in England but people come to cheer on the team and have a nice day out with the family. As with many things in Korea they don’t seem to take it too seriously. I am an avid football fan myself and sometimes the lack of passion does get to me but when I reflect on it they seem to have the right idea.

Just because the passion seems to be lacking a little that doesn’t mean that they are devoid of it completely, quite the contrary. The atmosphere from the away fans and the dedicated section for the ‘mad green boys’ (Jeonbuk’s hardcore) seems to be full of singing and drumming. The lack of atmosphere comes from the fact that the away fans at the latest game I went to, against Daejeon Citizen probably numbered around 50-100 fans and the hardcore home fans don’t number much more than this.
The songs they sing are quite interesting and it is possibly worth the trip to see a game just to hear what they are going to sing.

The K league was founded in 1983 and judging by what they have sung at some of the games they looked to England for inspiration. At the latest game Daejeon’s main chant was based on the tune of ‘Popeye the sailor man’(not particularly English I know). It's Funny when you have to do a kind of double take, or double listen and you recognise the tune amongst the Korean lyrics. Even more ear lifting was at the game of Jeonbuk versus Suwon. With Suwon being founded in 1996 and Jeonbuk in 1994 they have not had the time clubs in England have had to form a history and a set of traditions and so it would seem that they have borrowed from English clubs and English music. As a Liverpool fan it was a bit strange and at times chilling to be so far from the UK yet hear several thousand fans singing very familiar tunes. Yellow submarine and ob la di ob la da were the first and the final twist was when the crowd started singing ‘Scouser Tommy’, they obviously had Korean lyrics but the tune was unmistakable.

Suffice it to say, I am glad to watch premiership football when I get the chance and there is no competition which is the better league but Koreans have a different attitude to things and football is no exception.