One Team (3)
Injuries were inseparable from a footballer’s life — same as any other sport, really.
Twenty-two men chasing a single ball across a pitch measuring, on average, a hundred and five meters long and sixty-eight wide, each of them covering nearly ten kilometers a match. Physical battles for possession were routine; malicious, rough challenges cropped up more often than anyone liked to admit. The longer a player stayed in the game, the more inevitable it became that he would carry one or two nagging injuries as a matter of course.
Of course, there were the so-called Iron Kings — the rare few whose obsessive self-care and freakish durability meant they almost never went down. But they were the exception. Most players simply had to invent their own ways of surviving a stint on the sidelines.
Han Yong-ho’s method was talking it out with a close senior.
Thirty-four years old, already in the twilight of his career, he had debuted as a pro with Jeju and now wore the badge of Jeonbuk Future Motors. When the injuries piled up, he went to see the man who had always looked out for him.
“Come on, Yong-ho. Thirty-four is still prime time. What era do you think we’re living in? Techniques have improved, recovery science is better, and you take care of yourself. You’re already talking retirement?”
“Even so… Ja-cheong hyung, there aren’t many guys left in the league older than me.”
“What does that matter? Your body can still play. So you keep playing. Look at Pepe from Real — five years ago he was still turning out as a pro at forty.”
“That’s true, but…”
“Look, it’s your career. I’m not in any position to tell you what to do. But I’ve seen too many guys with the legs and the quality still there hang it up just because they started second-guessing themselves. You end up with a mountain of regret. Does the team still need you? Then I don’t think it’s a bad idea to keep going.”
Gu Ja-cheong.
Like Yong-ho, he had started his professional life at Jeju. A true legend who had thrived in the Bundesliga. From before Yong-ho’s debut all the way into middle age, whenever he needed help or a straight answer, he would meet Gu Ja-cheong and talk it through. The conversations usually began with genuine advice and, without fail, drifted into whatever gossip was floating around the league.
Gu Ja-cheong watched Yong-ho fall quiet, then picked up the phone sitting on the table and shoved the screen toward him.
“By the way, you seen this? Your club’s got a ridiculously entertaining rookie. Baek Yi-an. Holding midfielder, strikes the ball like a dream. Personality’s something else, though. Does a celebration right in front of the guy who just scored an own goal, rips Ulsan in interviews… Isn’t it hilarious?”
“What the hell is this…”
The longer the clip played, the more Han Yong-ho’s face curdled.
The senior was right about one thing: the kid on the screen was absurdly good. Yong-ho was in no position to hand out grades, but even through a phone display the fundamentals looked rock-solid. A veteran with years under his belt found himself quietly impressed.
The problem was everything else.
Mocking celebrations aimed at a senior teammate after an own goal. Using community-tier trash talk in official interviews. The talent was real. The manners were not.
“I’m sorry, hyung. When I get back I’ll straighten him out prope—”
“Ow!”
“Fix what, you idiot? What’s the kid even done wrong?”
“There has to be mutual respect, though…”
Yong-ho’s expression had gone rigid, but the man who stopped the anger boiling over was Gu Ja-cheong himself.
What? I thought he showed me the video so I’d go tear into the kid… Was that not it?
Yong-ho scratched his head and looked at him, puzzled. Gu Ja-cheong downed a glass of water and started talking.
“Respect, my ass. Honestly, so what if he’s a little short on manners? That Seong-ryong kid you love so much did a kangaroo celebration at Un-jae hyung after Adebayor scored against him in the Tokyo derby. Why do you like him so much? And Park Dong-jun? You know he did the territory-marking celebration against Jeonbuk. Whenever you meet that guy you practically bow. He’s the absolute authority on mock celebrations in the K League — so why the double standard? One more. You’ve been on Lee Chun-soo hyung’s YouTube before, right? You know he used to trash Seoul out loud when he was at Ulsan?”
“Still… that’s different.”
“Yong-ho. I’ve looked after you since the Jeju days, you know that. But you’ve got one real problem: you have zero flexibility.”
“Flexibility?”
“Yeah. Flexibility. From the other team’s side, sure — a baby-faced rookie mocking you can sting. But you don’t take that out on the pitch. You get better and you get even. On the field you drop the rank badges and fight.”
A junior showing proper respect to a senior had always been Han Yong-ho’s ideal. It was one of the few beliefs that had never shifted through his entire professional life. After all, the reason Jeju had dropped to the second division was endless internal fighting and a complete lack of cohesion. After living through relegation once, he had become hypersensitive about hierarchy.
Had he been wrong the whole time?
“A junior treating a senior with respect is the ideal, yeah. But if the junior does that, the senior has to show something worth respecting. Yong-ho. Be honest — at Jeonbuk you’ve been the guy enforcing discipline, telling the kids to show respect to seniors from other clubs. But when your own juniors got ignored or baited by the other team’s veterans, how many times did you actually step in and handle it?”
“…”
“Just being the oldest and wearing the armband doesn’t make you captain. If your youngest is getting torn apart by some veteran from the other side, you go over there and shut it down. That’s how juniors learn to trust you and follow you. And the kids you’re talking about? They didn’t even do anything that wrong.”
There was nothing to argue with.
The reason Han Yong-ho had looked at Baek Yi-an, Yoon Seung-hwan, Han Gang-rok, and Han Gyeong-rok with such a sour eye was nothing more than the mock interviews and the cheeky celebrations. None of them had ever talked back to seniors; if anything, the common opinion around the squad was that they were polite, diligent kids. The discomfort had come solely from Yong-ho trying to force them into the mold of his own ideal junior.
Realizing how stupid that had been, he stared blankly at his side plate. Gu Ja-cheong snorted a soft laugh and piled several pieces of meat onto it.
“It’s a good time to be playing. I hate saying this, but when I was young the K League grounds were half empty. These days the national team’s strong, the overseas players keep coming through, and the stadiums actually fill up. Jeonbuk’s average attendance already cracked twenty-five thousand, right?”
“Yes.”
“The guys still playing need to keep that momentum climbing. You know it as well as I do — outside of the national team, the best way to grow the league is producing players with star power. Every retired senior I know would say the same.”
Gu Ja-cheong paused, clapped Yong-ho on the shoulder, and smiled.
“And those star-power kids are sitting in your dressing room. Especially Baek Yi-an. Look after him. Don’t let him get hurt out there. Seong-ryong asked me the same thing, quietly.”
Words from the senior he had admired since the day he first kicked a ball. They hit Han Yong-ho hard enough to crack the rigid philosophy that had been walling him in for years.
“What the fuck did you just do to our youngest? You throw a ball at his face? Want me to throw one at yours, you son of a bitch?”
“Hey. Han Yong-ho. What the hell are you—”
“Yong-ho hyung! You never act like this — why all of a sudden—”
It was more than enough to rewrite the values that had locked him shut.
Han Yong-ho stared at Hwang Eun-chan, whose throat was clamped in his fist. The man’s eyes were trembling; this was the last behavior anyone who remembered the old Yong-ho would have expected, and Hwang clearly could not process what was happening.
Yong-ho couldn’t process it either. The man who had always treated every senior with polished respect, no matter the badge, never imagined he would step forward like this. Even now a part of him wondered if he should let go and bow his head in apology.
He did not loosen his grip.
He had decided to change. And more than that — the oldest player on the team was not about to bow his head to a player from the other side while the youngest kid on the squad was watching.
Hold the line. That was Han Yong-ho’s stance.
The referee’s whistle screamed.
“Han Yong-ho! Hwang Eun-chan! Stop it right now! You’re both off! Separate! The rest of you too! Anyone who starts another mess gets more than a yellow! Everyone back!”
Even after collecting the dishonor of a red card on his first match back from injury, he walked off the pitch feeling strangely light.
The chaos from the bench-clearing and the mutual red cards only finally settled once the half-time whistle blew.
“Haa…”
“…”
The dressing room felt like it had been submerged underwater. No one opened their mouth until Manager Sun Ki-baek broke the silence.
“Our captain and Hwang Eun-chan threw hands on the pitch and both got sent off. I get why the mood’s heavy. We also showed the fans something ugly. But… I didn’t look at what you did as purely a bad thing.”
“…”
“When our youngest went down after taking that ball from Hwang Eun-chan, every single one of you ran in without hesitation. No one held back. You all exploded with the same anger. That moved me. You can call it sarcasm if you want, but I mean it. I liked what I saw.”
He laid a hand over his chest, smiled, and paced slowly through the dressing room as he continued.
“What I value most in football is one team. Everyone becoming one. I just saw that with my own eyes. Hoo… maybe I’m rambling because I finally saw something fun again after a long time. Anyway, what I’m trying to say is this: don’t get small just because the captain got sent off. Their side lost a veteran too.”
He’s right. If anything, they’re the ones in worse shape.
Jeonbuk’s captain Han Yong-ho and Daegu’s veteran Hwang Eun-chan. On the surface a captain and a veteran walking the same red-card path might look even — but Yong-ho hyung had been out injured last season; this was his comeback match. Jeonbuk had been playing well without him. Daegu, on the other hand, had just lost a player who was basically the spine of their side. That mistake was going to hurt them far more.
“We scored first. We’re still on top. So keep doing what we’ve been doing and push. Don’t worry about the ugly look we gave the fans. Win and it washes away. Understood?”
“Yes!”
“Good. Prepare properly for the second half. Grab the three points on the road and go home.”
The moment the speech ended, a thunder of applause rolled through the room. I clapped along and was about to stand when Yong-ho hyung quietly stepped up beside me and put a hand on my shoulder.
“Hyung? Something you wanted to say?”
“Nothing big… just that for the rest of the match I want you to play however you want.”
“However I want?”
I smiled a little at the sudden remark. He smiled back.
“You’ve been watching the seniors’ faces a lot, haven’t you? Drop that now. Play free. And don’t carry the red card around in your head. Got it?”
“Yes. I’ll play free.”
“Good. But free doesn’t mean half-assed. Run like a rookie who still has something to prove — just keep your head light. Go do well.”
He patted my shoulder twice and went back to his seat.
It felt nothing like the Han Yong-ho I had read about in the novel, but I decided not to overthink it. Maybe watching me while he recovered from injury had changed his mind — the same way the national-team seniors all started trying to get close after they actually played with me.
No need to dwell on it.
I sorted my thoughts and headed for the tunnel.
With one man already sent off, the manager abandoned the 4-2-3-1 he had prepared and shifted into a 4-2-3.
Yoon Seung-hwan
Park Yeon-woo — Chaperi
Kang Sang-yong — Baek Yi-an
Han Gyeong-rok — Jeong Seung-yun — Yoo Seung-won — Han Gang-rok
Joo Tae-yeong
To cover the hole left by Yong-ho hyung at center-back, he brought Seung-yun hyung — the usual starter — on for Chun-jae hyung.
Losing Chun-jae hyung, who had been the main distributor in the final third, could blunt the attack. But the manager had chosen an unexpected solution.
When we go forward I push up into the second line and help with distribution. Gang-rok and Gyeong-rok take turns filling my spot. And when the back line builds, the keeper steps up and joins in.
Defensively it left us a little shaky. Offensively it could hit almost as hard as a full eleven. We already had the lead; rather than sit on a one-goal cushion, the manager was willing to risk a concession if it meant stretching the scoreline.
Fortunately, the plan was working.
“Yi-an! You can take it and drive if you want — if it looks off, the right’s open!”
“Yes.”
A straight ball from Sang-yong hyung’s three-quarter position into me, sitting in the opposition’s second line. I took it on the half-turn and immediately switched it out to Chaperi on the right wing.
“Half-space is open! Close the winger! And mark the holding mid too!”
Daegu’s back line was screaming, scrambling to think their way out of a bad situation. What they clearly had not prepared for was Jeonbuk — already a goal up — abandoning defense entirely and throwing every body forward.
“Come on, come out! Stop bodying me, PUTA! You bastard!”
A heavy strike.
Daegu’s defense got sucked out of shape. Chaperi’s cut-back into the space they left found me perfectly, and I took the chance without a second thought.
First touch into the shot.
From that range, with the keeper half-expecting a pass, there was no better way to punish him. I was sure. No reason to hesitate.
Another heavy strike.
Chaperi’s cut-back became my shot in one continuous motion.
“What?”
As expected, the Daegu keeper never thought I would hit it from there. He threw himself into a desperate dive — only for the ball to be blocked by the last person anyone expected.
A dull thud.
“Ugh!”
“What the hell is Yoon Seung-hwan doing…”
He must have thought my shot was a pass meant for him. He went for a header, took it square on the back of the skull, and the ball bounced straight back out.
Part of me wanted to kick him for being an absolute idiot… but I held it in. If it had been a pure team-kill that killed the chance, maybe. Instead, Seung-hwan’s trolling had accidentally done us a favor.
“Ah, damn it!”
“Argh! Yoon Seung-hwan, get out of the way!”
The second ball popped free. I was already sprinting onto it. I carved under the ball and whipped it toward the far post, the exact opposite side of the keeper’s dive.
A shot that ran like a torpedo. No way for the keeper to get there.
The net bulged.
“Haa… Just holding the line does nothing… At least mark someone!”
The keeper stood there with a hollow look, venting at his own defenders. Behind him the Mad Green Boys were already exploding.
I glanced at the bouncing away end, allowed myself one smile, then sprinted the other way.
There was still work left to do.