Members of the North Korean under-20 women’s soccer team greet people from a vehicle upon arrival in Pyongyang.
Photo: AFP – KIM WON JIN
The soccer players of the North Korean U-20 team received a triumphant welcome in their country after having won the World Cup of the category held in Colombia. North Korean women’s football, which occupies an important place globally, has been an opportunity to improve the country’s image internationally and surpass other world powers.
The North Koreans, who defeated Japan 1-0 in the final last Sunday in Bogotá, achieved the third world title in the category for women’s football in the country, after those of 2006 and 2016, which makes them equal to two other powers. like Germany and the United States.
“I am very happy to have given everything to honor our country,” declared team captain Chae Un Yong excitedly. The players, some of them crying and others overflowing with happiness, were welcomed by their families and several leaders of the country on the runway of the Pyongyang airport. They then paraded through the streets of the city aboard an open-top bus, decorated with flowers and painted in the colors of the North Korean flag.
“They thanked the citizens who cheered them, remembering that they played with the loving encouragement of all the inhabitants of the country,” reported the official press agency. KCNA.
North Korea’s victory in the U-20 World Cup came after several years of absence of this country’s athletes in international competitions due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Women’s soccer in Korea
North Korean women’s football occupies an important place in the world: the senior team occupies 9th place in the FIFA rankings, while its men’s counterpart is only 111th in the ranking.
In 1986, after the FIFA Congress at the 1986 World Cup in Mexico, where Norwegian Ellen Wille gave a memorable speech against discrimination in women’s football, Kim Jong-il gave the green light to a project that would change the landscape of women’s football. in North Korea.
“The ‘Kim dynasty’ saw in this discipline an opportunity to improve the country’s image internationally and surpass other world powers,” he summarized. Infobae.
Those responsible for the program turned to athletics to find the first players, who initially showed reluctance to change disciplines. However, in a regime where there is no place for dissent, the model was quickly consolidated, especially after seeing how South Korea won the battle to organize the 1988 Olympic Games, according to Denis Iglesias in a report for The Spanish Newspaper.
According to the Argentine portal, in one year, North Korea already had 18 women’s teams distributed throughout the country.
The construction of sports centers, such as the Pyongyang Football School, located next to the largest stadium in the world, the Rungrado First of May, would have been supported by FIFA, which in 2013, according to North Korean reports, contributed more than US$2 million, through the Goal Projects program.
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