At the beginning of last year, when Jeonbuk was struggling, not only Jeonbuk fans but also fans of other teams said, “I’m not worried about Jeonbuk,” and believed in a rebound.
In the end, Jeonbuk finished the season with decent results, winning the FA Cup and finishing as the league runner-up, proving once again that worrying about Jeonbuk was a mistake.
This season, however, is a different story. With the team still mired in the bottom half of the table long after they should have been on top, Jeonbuk fans, who are all too familiar with the situation, began to grow restless.
Instead of cheers, chants of “Get out” began to fill the stadium, and after the game, the team buses were often stuck in traffic, unable to move forward.
The situation got worse and worse, but the club’s front office had gotten used to the ’tilt’ and missed the ‘golden time’ of rebounding again and again.
In the end, Jeonbuk pulled out the card they never wanted to play: firing the coach as a last resort.
Slowly but surely, Jeonbuk started to move again. With 18 points, they’re seventh in the league. It’s still an unfamiliar position to be in, but it’s clear that Jeonbuk’s leadership realized, belatedly, that “this season is definitely different from previous years.”
Their first move was to hire the second foreign coach in the club’s history. Jeonbuk hired Romanian coach Dan Petrescu and is currently awaiting the final announcement.
Dan Petrescu will arrive in the country as soon as his visa is finalized.
Dan Petrescu will be accompanied by two coaches, including a physical coach. It’s a small staff of three, including the head coach, but Jeonbuk has spent a lot of money on its foreign coaching staff.
Jeonbuk reportedly asked director Park Ji-sung, who oversaw the recruitment, to find a coach worthy of Jeonbuk’s status without regard to money, which shows how determined the club is to rebound.
During the selection process, Jeonbuk considered not only four foreign coaches, but also domestic coaches.
One of the domestic candidates was currently managing a team in the K League, but Jeonbuk decided that it would be unseemly to bring in a coach who was leading a team during the season, so they turned to a foreigner.
This shows that the club was trying to do everything it could to regain its reputation.
Jeonbuk, which prides itself on being one of the few clubs in the K League to make big investments, missed a golden opportunity to change and innovate. 안전놀이터
This season, the club is paying the price, and as soon as Dan Petrescu arrives, Jeonbuk will sit down with director Park Ji-sung to reveal the club’s blueprint.
More important than the new coach’s soccer philosophy is the long-term vision of Jeonbuk as a leading K League club, which Park Ji-sung himself will tell the fans.
Having realized firsthand that they cannot become a leading club based on the name value of a player, and that they cannot escape from the crisis based on the name value of a player, fans are looking forward to seeing how the second half of the season will be different.