hankyoreh

By Marcus Han, Sprots Columnist

The North Korean team will be playing its second Group C match against a strong Swedish team in the 2011 FIFA Women’s World Cup in Germany. Facing the so-called “group of death,” North Korea fought hard in its first match against the world number one U.S. team, but lost 0-2. With favorite Sweden winning 1-0 over Colombia, the situation for North Korean so far has not been favorable. A berth in the quarterfinals will only be assured with victories over both Sweden and final group opponent Colombia.

Under these circumstances, the team might be expected to be in somewhat low spirits, but the players have been surprisingly positive and light-hearted. Despite their inauspicious start, the North Korean athletes are positive they will make the quarterfinals with victories in their next two matches.

Team officials and players have generally had a positive view of them while traveling around the Augsburg Hotel, where the second matches are to be played. This has come as something of a surprise to hotel employees and guests, as well as players and officials for other countries’ teams, owing to the almost uniformly negative depiction of them in the news articles through which the general public has encountered the North Korean team. To go by the reports, the North Korean players are cooped up like soldiers without any freedom or rights, and the expectation is that they will have severe, unsmiling expressions on their faces to match.

For the media here, North Korea’s first match against the United States in Dresden on June 29 was second only to the German match in the level of interest accorded to it. Naturally, there was a torrent of story requests and fierce competition to cover the players. As the official in charge of the North Korean team, I had to respectfully decline more than twenty coverage requests a day in accordance with team policy and recommend attending the official interview instead, which placed be in a very awkward position. Upset over the refusal to grant an interview, some of the journalists would write very negative stories. I even saw one incredible article that painted me, a South Korean who grew up in Germany, as coldly rebuffing the request in collusion with the North Koreans.

But the North Korean athletes smile more than any country’s players at the hotel and offer friendly greetings. Everyone who has met them personally has come to realize that they are just like athletes from any other team, not tools for political propaganda, and that they are football players hoping to give their all for a victory at the World Cup.

Every team is given the opportunity to train on the ground where the next day's match will be held and test the grass. This is accompanied by an official press conference. But the questions posed to the North Korean team often seem like the sort of things one would encounter a political event rather than having any bearing on sports or football. North Korean coach Kim Kwang-min waved off such questions and requested that the reporters only ask questions about the match. Even so, the same questions came up again at the official press conference following the match.

It is somehow upsetting to see journalists merely writing negative pieces about the North Korean players, as though they are some secretive beings shrouded under a dark veil. But the non-media people who have met the team members have marveled at a different side of the team they did not know about before, and offered their support for the team to stay in the World Cup for as long as possible.

Please direct questions or comments to [englishhani@hani.co.kr]