The Away End Erupts
While the players of both teams dispersed to their respective halves and readied themselves for kick-off, the Ulsan Dolphins' manager studied Suwon Blue Sky's formation with narrowed eyes.
A 4-4-2, then. Different from the 4-3-3 Suwon usually run — and so is the personnel. They've clearly come with something planned today.
His gaze came to rest on Suwon's most advanced attacker. Shirt number fifty.
The number that had set the entire K League buzzing just a week ago.
Kim Hanbin... starting after all. They must have changed the whole formation because of that kid.
The Ulsan manager had watched Suwon's match against Gangwon the previous week himself, and he'd clicked his tongue more than once. Three goals down, a man sent off, and then — a rookie substitute with a name nobody had ever heard of, thrown on in what was obviously a dead game. He'd assumed they were simply giving the kid some experience in a match already lost.
Then the impossible happened. That rookie tore open the second half with an insane kick-off goal, followed it with a knuckleball free kick, and capped it off with a dramatic assist on the stoppage-time equalizer — single-handedly hauling his team back from the brink of defeat.
It had been a one-man show he could hardly believe even while watching it. And the man who had flipped that entire match on its head was one unknown rookie and no one else.
That free kick was anything but ordinary. I've already drilled it into the defenders — no fouls anywhere near the box, not today. All I can do is trust them on it.
He decided he'd better hammer the point home to his back line one more time.
If there's one silver lining... for all that physicality, he doesn't seem to have much of an aerial game, does he?
He was thinking of the final corner kick against Gangwon. Even in a moment so desperate that the opposing keeper had charged into the attack, the tall kid had stayed on the edge of the penalty area instead of venturing inside.
Watching it, the Ulsan manager had concluded the kid either couldn't head a ball or was afraid of contested duels in the air.
Hm. Well — in the end, it was precisely because he stayed out there that he could square that decisive assist to Cha Kangmin... Still, he looks like a shooter more than an aerial threat.
His analysis of Kim Hanbin was complete. The kid was undeniably dangerous — but there was no reason to be scared before a ball had even been kicked.
We are not Gangwon. We're the Ulsan Dolphins, top of the league. I refuse to lose to some green rookie here.
The manager's eyes sharpened. He rose from the bench and walked over to Seong Taeuk, the team's center-back, who had just returned from warming up.
"Taeuk."
"Yes, boss."
"Their striker today — number fifty over there. His shooting is no joke, so don't concede an inch of angle near the penalty box. And his free kicks are lethal too, so I mean it — zero fouls around the area. Understood?"
"Understood, boss."
Seong Taeuk nodded. The Ulsan manager gave his shoulder a light tap and went on.
"And remember — he's a brand-new rookie who just debuted last week. Get stuck into him out there, rough him up a little, apply the pressure, and cook him alive. You know how important winning the psychological battle early is."
Seong Taeuk smiled, letting his manager know the message had landed exactly as intended.
"Leave it to me, boss."
"Good. I'm counting on you."
With one last pat on the center-back's shoulder, the Ulsan manager returned to the bench.
The away match against Ulsan Dolphins had begun. For the first time in his career, Hanbin was experiencing a true road game — and instead of cheering fans, the opposing supporters' jeers pressed down on him from every direction, a pressure he felt with his whole body.
The first kick of the first half belonged to Suwon. Kim Hanbin rested his foot lightly on the ball at the center spot and waited for the referee's whistle. His gaze drifted, almost of its own accord, toward the opposing goal.
He'd briefly considered ambushing Ulsan with another sudden kick-off goal like the one against Gangwon, but their keeper was already planted firmly on his line, clearly alive to the possibility.
Hm... so kick-off goals are off the menu from now on, huh.
Swallowing his disappointment, Hanbin recalled the tactical instruction the manager had given before the match: drop the defensive line as deep as possible, and look for long balls on the counter.
Tweeeeet—!
The referee's whistle sounded, and Hanbin rolled the ball backward to a teammate, setting the match in motion.
Just as expected, the league-leading Ulsan Dolphins came flying out of the gates, swarming Suwon from the opening minutes. Razor-fast passing play, relentless wing attacks flooding down both flanks — and on top of it all, a ferocious press in midfield.
Ulsan's waves of attack kept coming, but Suwon's defense, anchored around Cha Kangmin, held them off with composure.
Then, around the fifteenth minute, after Suwon had absorbed one Ulsan assault after another, Cha Kangmin lifted his head. There, in his field of vision, was Kim Hanbin near the halfway line, one hand raised, ready to make his run.
Yes — go, take it!
Without a moment's hesitation, Cha Kangmin whipped a powerful long pass forward with his right foot, arcing high toward Hanbin.
The ball tore through the air toward Kim Hanbin's position. The instant he read its flight, Hanbin broke into a sprint, his eyes flicking between the descending ball and everything around it.
Ulsan's center-back stood guard directly ahead of him, while out on the left flank Enzo was sprinting alongside, locked in a fierce battle with the Ulsan wing-back.
By the time the long ball dropped, a Ulsan center-back had already claimed the landing spot. Hanbin was at a disadvantage in the duel before it even began.
But no rule of football says a man loses the ball just because someone else got there first.
"Hup!"
Kim Hanbin drove off the turf with every ounce of strength in his legs. His leap sailed clean over the head of the center-back who'd arrived first.
Thwack—!
The sweet, precise impact of the football against his forehead.
Got it!
The ball Hanbin had won dropped perfectly into the path of Enzo, who was already tearing forward at full speed from the left.
Enzo had his momentum built up, while the Ulsan wing-back marking him was a step behind and visibly struggling to catch up.
Ball at his feet, Enzo charged toward the penalty box — and in the blink of an eye, found himself one-on-one with the keeper.
Sensing the danger of the one-on-one, the Ulsan goalkeeper rushed off his line to narrow the angle and hurled himself into a sliding tackle at Enzo's feet.
At that moment, Enzo shouted toward Hanbin.
"¡Kim!"
Instead of trying to round the keeper, Enzo clipped a lofted through-pass into the space in front of Hanbin — where no one stood.
Nothing between the ball and the wide-open goal.
The Ulsan center-back who had jumped with Hanbin threw himself desperately at him, body-checking him with everything he had.
It was useless.
With a single arm, Hanbin casually brushed off the center-back's interference, then brought his right foot to meet the rolling ball.
Shhhk—!
A featherlight touch off the inside of his right boot. The ball rolled gently across the line, rippling the net.
An opening goal — and not just any opener, but a road goal for relegation-battling Suwon, struck against the league's top side, Ulsan Dolphins.
The Suwon Blue Sky away supporters, packing the away section of Ulsan Football Stadium to the last seat, exploded.
"WAAAAAAAH—!! KIM HAN-BIN! KIM HAN-BIN!"
The Suwon faithful hurled themselves into each other's arms, pounded their drums, and screamed his name until their voices tore.
The first to reach the goalscorer was the man who had set him up — Enzo. He crashed into Hanbin, wrapped him in a crushing hug, and shouted in Spanish.
"¡Kim! ¡Lo creí! ¡La próxima vez, no olvides ayudarme!"
"¡Bueno! ¡Jajaja!"
Laughing, Hanbin thumped Enzo on the back. The rest of the Suwon players came flooding in, slapping Hanbin's shoulders and back as they savored the joy of the opening goal together.
And on the Suwon bench, every single hand was in the air. The moment the ball hit the net, the entire coaching staff and every bench player shot to their feet, threw their arms skyward, and collapsed into each other's embraces.
"WAAAAAH!!! IT'S IN!!!"
That's it!
Manager Kim Seongcheol, unable to contain himself, launched a single uppercut into the air.
The tactic that players and staff had built together. Cha Kangmin's long ball, Kim Hanbin's aerial duel, Enzo's surge, and Hanbin's finish to cap it off. Every gear had meshed — click, click, click — and produced a perfect goal. In that instant, Kim Seongcheol found himself thinking that maybe this very feeling was why he'd become a manager in the first place.
The head coach beside him spoke up, voice giddy with excitement.
"Boss! It worked to perfection!"
"It did! And Hanbin won that duel for us!"
It had been an aerial battle fought from a losing position, with the defender already camped on the landing spot — and Hanbin had won it anyway. Right now, that kid was impossible not to adore.
Kim Hanbin's opening goal had shifted the stadium's atmosphere toward Suwon — but a side fighting for the top of the league does not crumble so easily.
If anything, the unexpected blow seemed to enrage Ulsan, and their offensive grew even fiercer than it had been in the opening minutes.
"Push up!!"
"Heads on!!"
"We're running out of time — get one back NOW!"
The coaching staff's shouts erupted from the Ulsan bench, carrying so clearly across the pitch that Kim Hanbin could hear every word as he ran.
The players, too, began pressing Suwon with ferocious intensity. But Suwon's defensive line, having taken the lead once already, had hardened into something far more stubborn than before.
On top of that, Ulsan's wing-backs — wary of the counter-attacking threat posed by Hanbin and Enzo — could no longer commit to their overlapping runs with the same abandon. Naturally, the flank play that formed the backbone of Ulsan's attack grew blunted, weaker than it had been before Suwon's goal.
Then, deep in the first half, after Suwon had snuffed out yet another Ulsan assault, Cha Kangmin killed an opposing striker's dribble with a clean tackle deep in his own half and looked up.
Once again, his eyes met Kim Hanbin's exactly — the kid hovering near the halfway line, poised to run.
BOOM—!
The ball left Cha Kangmin's foot and once again stretched long and true down the pitch, powerful and precise.
Burned once already, Ulsan's defense was ready this time. One center-back sprinted to read the landing spot and claimed it early, while the other clamped onto Hanbin's back, jostling and grappling to disrupt the aerial duel.
A textbook double-mark.
Hanbin thought, Yeah — beating something like this is the least my muscles can do, after everything I put them through!