Allez O’ FC Sookmyung!
Who said girls have no interest in sports? Who said soccer is just a sport for men? Here are the girls who kick and run for the goals, FC Sookmyung! Their passion and desire to play soccer leaded them to create their own soccer club last year. Eventhough it is only a year-old club, it is well known for its enthusiastic and active actions. The Sookmyung Times (SMT) met the captain of FC Sookmyung, Kim Se-Yeon (KIM) and sub-captain, Park Gah-Ram (PARK).
Foundation
Companion
Being different from other clubs, in some free time, they are doing something special. Not just going on a club trip, but they are going to a stadium with club members. Not only K-league but also K3-league, to see the soccer matches and learn some skills such as passing play. The K3-league club, ‘Seoul United’ has soccer matches in Hyochang Park every Saturtday. Many people go to see the game when they have time on Saturday. “K3-league players are also very professional, but compare to the K-league, their skills are easier to learn for us,” Kim said. This is one of the main reasons why members of FC Sookmyung go to Hyochang Park and see the games.
Strive
There are 26 members in FC Sookmyung. All members choose their own position and participate as real players. Every Friday they practice in the Grand Auditorium with a coach, but the place is not so good for practicing soccer. Therefore, freshmen and sophomores who have time, go to Hyochang Park to exercise about 1-2 hours on thursday. Twice a month they reserve a small spare stadium of Seoul Sangam Worldcup Stadium and practice on the field. Starting with some easy stretches and they end up the practice by playing some mini games like Futsal1. Also they have some friendly matches with girls’ soccer teams from other schools. With this hard practicing, the best eleven players are picked by a coach according to players own abilities. They make a best line-up for ‘Womens University Soccer Club Match. ’ Not only this effort, but also they learn some sports marketing throughout the process to get sponsors to host the ‘Womens University Soccer Club Match. ’ They make some presentation slides and have a presentation in- front of many companies like Adidas or Nike to get supports for the gift and trophy for the winner. “This was the best experience that I had in this club. Through hosting the big club matches by ourselves, we can give a chance to many other girls’ soccer teams to play on the ground. We can’t explain how big achievement that we get from hosting that event. We can only say that it was just fantastic!” Both Kim and Park said.
Match
Having a weakness that there are no men players to give some advices for FC Sookmyung, but by themselves they are achieving many things. Not knowing soccer skills is not a problem to be a team member of FC Sookmyung. All you need is passion!