You Have to Prove It
Suwon Blue Sky's locker room was spacious and comfortable.
Lockers bearing each player's name and number stood in tidy rows, and at the center of the room sat a large whiteboard for tactical discussions.
Kim Hanbin walked over to find his own spot. Number 50, Kim Hanbin. His name, his number.
And inside it hung a crisp, freshly pressed blue uniform.
So this is... my place now.
Kim Hanbin stood before his locker for a moment, gazing quietly at the uniform. While he was still fiddling with it, the physical coach came in and called out.
"Alright, let's head out for warm-ups!"
At the coach's words, Hanbin changed into the training gear the club had issued and headed out to the pitch with the other players.
There was still plenty of time before kickoff, but the players each began loosening up with serious expressions on their faces.
Kim Hanbin eased the tension from his body with a light jog and some stretching.
As he warmed up, he lifted his head toward the stands and saw that they were gradually filling up.
Fans in blue uniforms and scarves were finding their seats one by one, each clutching their cheering gear, while several supporters bustled about on the railings, hoisting up enormous banners and placards.
One young supporter setting up a banner near the front spotted Kim Hanbin loosening up on the pitch and called out cheerfully.
"Hey! Over there! You're Kim Hanbin, right?! I saw you on Cha Kangmin's YouTube yesterday! Good luck in the match today!"
Kim Hanbin waved back at him.
"Thank you! I'll do my best!"
It was only one person's encouragement, but it gave him real strength.
Yeah. Let's win today, no matter what.
Before long, warm-ups ended and the players returned to the locker room for the final team meeting before kickoff.
Once everyone had gathered, Manager Kim spoke up.
"The starting lineup goes as announced yesterday. And..."
The manager looked at Yoon Hyeonjin.
"Yoon Hyeonjin and Enzo will lead the attack today. Hyeonjin, you're feeling good?"
"Yes, Manager! No problems at all!"
There was a fiercer fighting spirit in Yoon Hyeonjin's voice than usual. He stole a quick glance at Kim Hanbin, then turned his eyes back to the front.
Manager Kim turned his gaze to Kim Hanbin, who was on the substitution list.
"And Kim Hanbin. You'll start on the bench today. Depending on how things go—especially if a good free-kick opportunity opens up late in the match—I'm planning to bring you on as a joker. Hanbin, can you handle that?"
The manager asked while looking him straight in the eye. Kim Hanbin answered without a moment's hesitation.
"Yes, Manager! Leave it to me!"
Satisfied with his answer, Manager Kim gave a nod.
Once every player had finished preparing, Manager Kim Seongcheol stepped to the center of the locker room. His expression was more grave and resolute than they had ever seen it.
"Alright, everyone ready?!"
"Yes!"
The players' thunderous response rang through the locker room.
"You all know how important today's match is. There's nowhere left to retreat—this is our home! This is OUR house! We win today, no matter what. We snap the losing streak and turn this whole thing around! Understood?!"
"Yes!"
Strength surged into the manager's voice.
"Our opponents are Gangwon. They won't be easy, but we can absolutely beat them. Trust in the sweat we've poured out these past few days—trust in your teammates!"
The manager looked each player in the eye as he continued.
"Let's take all three points today! Can you do it?!"
"Yes! We can!"
The players' roar erupted. Then Cha Kangmin, the team's captain, stepped forward.
"Just like the Manager said—let's win today, no matter what!"
"Who are we?!" Cha Kangmin led the chant.
"ONE TEAM!" the players roared back.
He had changed into his full uniform and was about to leave the locker room when a sudden signal came from his stomach. Nerves, probably. Kim Hanbin hesitated for a moment, then went looking for a bathroom. The one near the locker room would be packed with players, so he deliberately headed for one tucked away in a far corner.
Fortunately, it was empty inside. Kim Hanbin pushed open the door of a stall and sat down on the toilet.
He was catching his breath and sorting through his jumbled thoughts when he heard someone enter the bathroom from outside.
Then two voices began to carry through.
"Hey, so what the hell is up with that Kim Hanbin kid? Four days with the team and he's already on the substitution list? I've been here for months, damn it. Can't even make the bench, let alone the starting lineup. What a joke, seriously."
"No clue, man. They say he's a free-kick joker, but it's not like a scoring-range free kick just appears every single game. And they can't sub him out in the first half either, so really he'd only get a few minutes at the very end, right? It's all for show."
"Probably just the U22 rule, isn't it? How many was it again? Don't they have to stuff two players under twenty-two onto the bench? So yeah, it's just tokenism."
"Ugh, for fuck's sake! If I were just a little younger, I could've sat on a bench like that too. God, it pisses me off."
Their conversation was unmistakably aimed at Hanbin himself.
Kim Hanbin held his breath inside the stall. It was unpleasant—but at the same time, it was a reaction he had half expected.
A pair of bastards... Well, no. From everyone else's perspective, I probably look like a perfect parachute hire. Can't really blame them.
They weren't wrong, after all.
He had appeared out of nowhere, with zero track record, right when the team was in crisis, and claimed a spot on a limited substitution list.
From the standpoint of players who had worked hard all this time, it was more than fair for them to feel it was unfair.
The two men grumbled their way out of the bathroom. Only after confirming they were completely gone did Kim Hanbin push open the stall door and move to step out.
But just before he could open the bathroom door, a sharp sound rang out from the corridor.
Slap—!
Slap—!
Loud cracks, like someone being struck across the face. Kim Hanbin froze mid-step.
"You. Fucking. Idiots."
A low, threatening voice followed.
That voice is...?
Kim Hanbin remembered it.
The veteran midfielder who had picked a fight with him on his first day at training—and then offered an apology after seeing his free-kick skills.
"You pieces of shit. You should be thinking about making the list—starting or bench—because YOU'RE good enough. Instead, what are you doing? Talking trash about the team's youngest rookie? And you still call yourselves his teammates? You're lucky this is some out-of-the-way corner nobody comes to. If a league official or anyone from Gangwon had overheard you on a match day like today, they'd have written Suwon off as a total circus. Right? A place where so-called seniors who can't even make the squad come to trash-talk the team rookie!!"
Fury blazed in the veteran's voice.
"W-we're sorry, senior!"
"We're truly sorry!"
The two players' frantic apologies rang out.
"Consider yourselves lucky it was me who caught you. If Kangmin had heard this, you wouldn't even be treated like human beings today. Got it? Now get out of my sight."
"Y-yes! Understood!"
The sound of two players scrambling away grew distant.
A moment later, the bathroom door creaked open and the veteran stepped inside—
—and came face to face with Kim Hanbin, who had failed to time his exit and was now standing awkwardly in front of the stalls.
"......"
"......"
Flustered embarrassment was written all over the veteran's face. Kim Hanbin, equally at a loss, stood rooted to the spot.
It was hard to believe this man had been the owner of that razor-sharp voice from the corridor just moments ago. He awkwardly averted his gaze and cleared his throat.
"Ahem... How long were you standing there?"
"Uh... I... just now..."
When Kim Hanbin mumbled an evasion, the veteran let out a resigned sigh.
"You heard everything, huh...? Well... no, of course you did. Hard not to."
He scratched his head for a moment, then spoke.
"Anyway... I'm sorry on their behalf. That's just the state of this team's atmosphere, you know... Honestly, on your first day here... I wasn't so different from those guys myself..."
He stopped mid-sentence and shook his head.
"No, that's not it... Ugh, dammit... God, this is embarrassing."
The veteran's face genuinely flushed with mortification.
"It's fine, senior. Really. I... I understand."
"Understand, my ass. Anyway..."
The veteran chose his words carefully for a moment, then looked Kim Hanbin straight in the eye and spoke with sudden seriousness.
"But listen, Hanbin. This might sound like me gushing, but you need to hear it."
"......?"
"You have to show them."
The senior's eyes were fixed on Hanbin, unwavering by even a fraction.
"Those guys... and most of the players here, they've been kicking a ball their whole lives, since elementary school. In school football clubs, they've seen it over and over—kids clawing their way into starting spots because their parents slipped the coach money instead of on merit, or the rumors of it... They've watched and heard that kind of thing until they were sick of it. And in reality, it happens constantly."
He gave a bitter smile.
"That's all they know. So when someone like you appears out of nowhere—with no track record—rumors and noise are inevitable. They'll doubt you, envy you, try to tear you down however they can. That's just human nature."
The veteran gave Kim Hanbin's shoulder a light pat.
"That's why, Hanbin, you have to prove it yourself. With your own skill, you have to smash every last one of those prejudices. If you want to keep Kangmin and the Manager from getting blamed for their judgment—want to prove their eyes weren't wrong—you have to show it yourself."
His words were rough, but wrapped inside them was earnest advice and genuine worry for Kim Hanbin.
"......I understand, senior."
Kim Hanbin bowed his head in answer. The veteran looked at him for a moment longer, then said, "Good. Then go get ready for the match," and stepped out of the bathroom first.
Left alone, Kim Hanbin stood before the mirror and stared at his own face.
I have to prove it, huh...
The senior's words were carved deep into his mind.
With the referee's whistle, the K League 1 match against Gangwon Ocean FC finally began.
Even before kickoff, a wave of blue uniforms had filled Section N of Suwon World Cup Stadium to capacity.
Suwon Blue Sky's supporters burst into their anthem as if on cue.
[Ohhhh~ We love you! My love! My Suwon! Ohhhh~ We adore you! We love you and you alone!]
Tens of thousands of voices became one, and the swelling anthem shook the entire stadium.
Seated on the bench, Kim Hanbin felt goosebumps rise all over his body without his meaning to.
What would it feel like, to play a match inside this kind of heat?
Kwon Yeongdae, sitting beside him, seemed to read the expression on Hanbin's face and smiled proudly.
"Just you wait, Hanbin. Those folks are the finest supporters in the K League—our very own 'Fronte Three-Color.' No matter how bad things get for the team, they never stop singing."
And just as Kwon Yeongdae said, the supporters' cheers never paused for a breath, keeping the stadium blazing hot.
But despite their passionate support, the match on the pitch began drifting in a completely unexpected direction.
Around the 15th minute of the first half, with Suwon Blue Sky on the attack, Yoon Hyeonjin—the starting striker at the tip of the spear—took the ball near the halfway line.
And then, in the course of a fierce physical duel with a Gangwon midfielder, he began dribbling—slowly, steadily—backward, away from Gangwon's goal and toward Suwon's own.
"Huh?!"
"Hey! Hyeonjin! What the hell is he doing?!"
Manager Kim and the coaching staff on the bench cried out in disbelief.
"Hey! Hey! Hyeonjin! What are you doing! Don't come over here!"
Even Choi Hyunsoo, the goalkeeper whose usual gentleness never cracked, was screaming in desperation—and every word of it carried clearly to the bench where Kim Hanbin sat.
But Yoon Hyeonjin, as though possessed by something, kept driving the ball into his own half.
In the end, he tangled with his own panicked defender and lost the ball in the most absurd way imaginable.
That ball went straight to a Gangwon attacker, and in an instant, it became a goal against them.
Zero to one.
They had conceded the opening goal to an utter blunder. Yoon Hyeonjin collapsed to his knees where he stood, face hollowed out with shock.
And yet, the Suwon supporters' chants did not stop. If anything, they urged the players on with even louder voices.
[Fight on! Suwon! Fight on! Suwon! Fight on! Suwon!]
Spurred on by the cheering, the players regrouped—but once a match began to unravel, it refused to come back together.
The defensive line, restored by Cha Kangmin's return, held relatively steady, but the attack remained suffocating.
Then, around the 30th minute of the first half, Suwon found themselves defending a Gangwon corner kick.
The headed clearance, meant to punch the ball away—of all things—bounced off the head of the athletic veteran defender standing in front of goal and dropped straight into the net.
An own goal. Zero to two.
A deep groan rolled through the bench. But the players steadied each other and dug in once more.
"It's fine! There's plenty of time left!"
"Heads up! Let's go again!"
The athletic veteran defender, too, hung his head under the weight of his own goal, but with his teammates' encouragement, he reignited his fighting spirit.
But as the saying goes, beneath rock bottom there's a basement.
Throwing himself eagerly into defense to make up for the own goal, that same athletic defender lunged to stop an opposing attacker's dribble just before the end of the first half—and inside the penalty area, he committed a reckless tackle.
Triiill—!
With the referee's whistle came the call: penalty kick. And a straight red card for the veteran defender.
Choi Hyunsoo threw his body full stretch, but the Gangwon attacker's penalty split the net cleanly.
Zero to three. And a man down.
Then, almost immediately, the whistle blew for the end of the first half.
The players trudged toward the locker room, faces drained of all expression.
Down 3-0 at home. A man short after a sending off, too. It was the worst possible first half.
...Though, come to think of it—maybe this is exactly the chance I've been waiting for?