Friday was the announcement of the drawings for the 2010 World Cup in South Africa.  South Korea is in Group B and they will play against perennial powerhouse Argentina, Nigeria and past Euro champs Greece.  However, does the South Korean soccer team really matter to Korean-Americans?  Who would they root for: the U.S. or South Korea?  We know they’re not rooting for North Korea, who happened to make the World Cup as well.  This is an opinion and there is no empirical evidence of this, but I would suggest that the Korean-Americans who end up watching the World Cup games will have a stronger interest in the performance of the South Korean team than the U.S. team.  Though anecdotal, I take you back to 2002 when South Korea progressed to the semi-finals, its greatest performance ever in a World Cup.  It not only captivated the Korean peninsula with masses of South Koreans watching games on massive TVs in public venues, but you could also see the excitement and support here in the U.S.  Our parents were talking to us about it and not about school or marriage.  They would share how proud they were of the South Korean team doing so well.  Many of us are immigrants to the U.S. and the World Cup created a tangible connection to our Korean heritage.  I personally remember staying up till the wee hours of the morning to watch the games at a Korean restaurant in Ktown New York.  When the South Korean team won a game, West 32nd street would get flooded with people (at 5AM!) cheering.  That was a cool scene and a moment to remember.   In almost six months, the most popular game on earth will stage its biggest event and I hope you all can root for both South Korea and the U.S.  I paraphrase a famed Korean senator by saying that South Korea is our mother and America is our father.  We can have our cake and enjoy it to so have fun rooting for both South Korea and the U.S. when the World Cup arrives in June.

You could possibly be rooting for three teams at the World Cup if you’re Korean-American.  You could be supporting the U.S. because we live here and you have citizenship.  You could be cheering on the South Korean team because of your connection to your heritage.  And the wild card but not really sure why you would is root for North Korea.  NOT!  Yeah they’re Korean but they’re still under one of the worst regimes  in the world and we shouldn’t support that.  However, it does make you wonder how good a Korean team could be if we had the best players from North and South Korea play together as one.  That may not happen in our lifetime, or Kim Jong-Il’s lifetime.

So let’s get back to the World Cup fun.  The South Korean team is in Group B and it seems like a real tough draw because you’re up against some big names like Argentina who may have the best player in the world in Lionel Messi.  However, the erratic and emotional coach of the Argentinian team, Diego Maradona, may sink that very talented ship as evidenced by his poor guidance of the team to barely qualifying for the World Cup.  That team is to talented to have barely qualified.  Nigeria was historically one of the better teams from the African continent but the talent level seems to have thinned out this year with their porous defense.   Greece is a recent Euro champion but has had trouble staying healthy.  And the opinion on the South Korean team?  The general consensus is that on paper, they may appear to be the least of the 4 teams in Group B, but they do have very better World Cup experience in the last decade, compared to their competitors and the South Koreans are known to be technically sound.  However, from a raw talent standpoint, they do have a couple players in the English Premiere League but then there’s a falloff, which means the overall talent is probably lesser than the other three countries.

What we do know is that the best teams do eventually win out in the World Cup like Italy in ’06 and Brazil’s five historical World Cup championships.  But once the first ball is kicked, it’s fun for the world to enjoy in the first few rounds and sometimes you get surprises like Turkey and South Korea advancing to the semi-finals in 2002.  Can’t wait for the first game in June 2010!

Interview with Kim Nam Il (김남일)

Interview with Lee Chung Yong (이청용)