The K League decentralization policy in 1995 was a policy of moving

K League K League (Hangul: K리그) is South Korea's professional football league. It includes first division K League 1 and second division K League 2. History Until the 1970s, South Korean football operated two major football leagues, the National S ...

clubs located in Seoul to other regions. It was an effort by the Government of South Korea and the K League Federation to increase popularity of football nationwide before the

2002 FIFA World Cup The 2002 FIFA World Cup, also branded as Korea Japan 2002, was the 17th FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial Association football, football world championship for List of men's national association football teams, men's national teams organized by ...

for which they bid. In accordance with it, the three K League clubs,

Yukong Elephants Jeju United Football Club (Hangul: 제주 유나이티드) is a South Korean professional Association football, football club based in Jeju Province that competes in the K League 1, the top division in South Korea. In the past, the club has bee ...

, Ilhwa Chunma and

LG Cheetahs FC Seoul ( ko, FC 서울) is a South Korean professional Association football, football club based in Seoul that competes in the K League 1, the top flight of Football in South Korea, South Korean football. The club is owned by GS Sports, a subs ...

, moved from Seoul to

Bucheon Bucheon () is a administrative divisions of South Korea, city in Gyeonggi Province, South Korea. Bucheon is located away from Seoul, of which it is a satellite town, satellite city. It is located between Incheon and Seoul. Bucheon is the second ...

Cheonan Cheonan (; 천안시, ''Cheonan-si''), also spelled Ch'ŏnan, is a city in South Chungcheong, South Korea. Cheonan has a population of 666,417 (2018), making it the most-populous city or county in South Chungcheong, and the third most-populous ci ...

and

Anyang Anyang (; ) is a prefecture-level city in Henan province, China. The northernmost city in Henan, Anyang borders Puyang to the east, Hebi and Xinxiang to the south, and the provinces of Shanxi and Hebei to its west and north respectively. It had a ...

, respectively, in 1996.

Overview

By 1995, there have been three professional football clubs based in Seoul: Ilhwa Chunma,

and

Federation wanted to spread football popularity nationally and secure football-specific stadiums for bidding of

. In order to achieve this goal, K League and Blue House forced all three clubs in Seoul to move to other cities. The intention was to compensate for the decreased number of home cities under the new system. This policy was not proceeded smoothly with the clubs affected by it, and brought resistances from them. K League Federation announced that if the clubs don't accept the decision, they will be excluded from the league. The federation also decided that one club among them could get the priority to return to Seoul, if it would build a

football-specific stadium Soccer-specific stadium is a term used mainly in the United States and Canada to refer to a sports stadium either purpose-built or fundamentally redesigned for soccer and whose primary function is to host soccer matches, as opposed to a multi-p ...

in Seoul. Then all three clubs agreed to move. Once the plan was announced, many city governments hoped to attract these clubs.

Details

Yukong Elephants

At first,

threatened K League that they would dissolve the club if they have to move out of Seoul. However, they took

's offer to give a new 20,000-seater Bucheon Stadium and another football-specific stadium including two training fields. They decided to use Seoul Mokdong Stadium as their temporary home ground until the construction of Bucheon Stadium to be completed. They changed their name to ''Bucheon Yukong'' as a part of the policy on 4 January 1996.

Ilhwa Chunma

promised Ilhwa Chunma that they would change the

Cheonan Oryong Stadium Cheonan Oryong Stadium (Oryong Civic Stadium) was a multi-use stadium in Cheonan, South Korea. It was used mostly for football matches. The stadium had a capacity of 21,000 people and opened in 1983. The stadium was demolished in 2009. Other Stad ...

into a football-specific stadium by paying ₩1.2 billion and would build another sports complex. Ilhwa accepted the offer, moved to Cheonan, and changed its name to ''Cheonan Ilhwa Chunma'' as a part of the policy on 29 March 1996.

LG Cheetahs

was regarding to move to

Changwon Changwon () is the capital city of Gyeongsangnam-do, on the southeast coast of South Korea. With a population of 1.07 million , Changwon is South Korea's ninth-most populous city. A port city, Changwon is bordered by Masan Bay to the south ...

as well, but decided to move to

due to the popularity of football in the region and the local characteristics. They changed their name to ''Anyang LG Cheetahs'' as a part of the policy on 26 April 1996.

Aftermath

K League started perfect "home and away system" from 1996 after all clubs got their own stadiums as a result. After the 2002 FIFA World Cup,

Korea Football Association The Korea Football Association () is the governing body of football and futsal within South Korea. It sanctions professional, semi-professional and amateur football in South Korea. Founded in 1933, the governing body became affiliated with F ...

needed to pay

Seoul Metropolitan Government The Seoul Metropolitan Government is a local government of Seoul, South Korea. The mayor is elected to a four-year term by the citizens of Seoul and is responsible for the administration of the city government. The Seoul Metropolitan Government d ...

₩25 billion as their share of the construction of Seoul World Cup Stadium. KFA wanted to find a new club in Seoul and let the club to pay the whole share, but it didn't happen. Seoul Metropolitan Government understood that potential investment on a new Seoul club had not made due to the amount of the share, they agreed to cut ₩10 billion in the way of sponsoring the new team with the same amount of money. Also, KFA agreed to pay ₩10 billion of their share to reduce the burden to a new Seoul club, leaving only ₩5 billion to pay. In the meantime, Anyang LG Cheetahs declared their interest in moving to Seoul and Seoul Metropolitan Government welcomed it, though KFA prioritized the foundation of a new club. But many candidate companies (including KT Corporation and

Kumho Asiana Group Kumho Asiana Group is a large South Korean ''Chaebol'' (conglomerate), with subsidiaries in the construction, leisure, and logistics industries. The group is headquartered at the Kumho Asiana Main Tower in Sinmunno 1-ga, Jongno-gu, Seoul, South ...

), which received proposal from KFA and K League, refused to found a new Seoul-based club. On 6 February 2004, K League Federation officially allowed the existing K League club's move to Seoul and sent relocation proposal to all K League clubs. KFA declared that if an existing club wants to move to Seoul, they need to pay ₩15 billion, due to the KFA's ₩10 billion offer was only under the condition of foundation of a new club. A few days later, however, KFA cut the share to pay to a half, ₩7.5 billion, with a prospect of a new Seoul club in future to pay the other half.

Busan I'Cons Busan IPark ( ko, 부산 아이파크) is a South Korean professional football club based in Busan that competes in K League 2, the second tier of the South Korean football pyramid. Its current home ground is Busan Gudeok Stadium. The club was on ...

also had declared their interest in being a new Seoul club, but later retreated their interest. Anyang LG Cheetahs finally returned to Seoul on 10 March 2004.

References

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Decentralization Policy In K League K League Football in Seoul Sport in Seoul Seongnam FC FC Seoul Jeju United FC Sports team relocations