The new professional football Hall of Fame enshrined four members in its inaugural class Tuesday, honoring some of the biggest names the sport has seen in the country.
The Korea Professional Football League (K League) decided to open the Hall of Fame in January to mark its 40th anniversary and selected its first class of inductees in March.
The honorees from three categories: "Stars" for players, "Leaders" for coaches and "Honors" for other contributors to the league, including administrators and industry figures. The Hall of Fame will honor four members in the Stars category and one each in the other two categories every two years from now.
The four ex-players enshrined Tuesday were: Choi Soon-ho, Hong Myung-bo, Shin Tae-yong and Lee Dong-gook, each representing different decades in K League history.
Choi, one of the top stars of the 1980s, netted 23 goals and picked up 19 assists in 100 matches. He was named to the season-end Best XI team in 1984 and helped Pohang to the league championship in 1986.
Choi has been active in coaching and administration since his retirement. He is currently general manager of Suwon FC and earlier served as technical director for Pohang. He previously coached Pohang and Gangwon FC.
Hong, another Pohang legend from the 1990s, wasted little time making his mark. As a rookie in 1992, Hong was voted the league MVP and took Pohang to the league title, while also making the Best XI squad.
The star defender, who logged 156 matches in the K League, made the All-Star team four more times and won the K League Cup in 1993. Hong is currently head coach of the reigning K League 1 champions Ulsan Hyundai FC.
Hong somehow missed out on the Rookie of the Year award in 1992, because fellow Hall of Fame inductee Shin Tae-yong grabbed that trophy while starring for Ilhwa Chunma.
Shin owns the K League record with nine appearances on the Best XI team. The midfielder was part of two "three-peat" teams, first from 1993 to 1995, and again from 2001 to 2003. Shin was voted the league MVP in 1995.
Shin is currently head coach of the Indonesian men's national team.
Lee Dong-gook, the K League's all-time leading scorer with 228 goals, rounded out the inaugural class of players. With 548 matches, Lee also holds the record for most appearances by an outfield player.
Lee lifted the K League championship trophy eight times, all of them with Jeonbuk Hyundai Motors between 2009 and 2020.
In his retirement, Lee recently served as vice president of the Korea Football Association.
Former coach Kim Jung-nam was the inaugural inductee in the Leaders category. He won the 1989 Coach of the Year award while with Yukong Elephants (currently Jeju United) and led Ulsan Hyundai FC to their second league championship in 2005.
The late POSCO founder Park Tae-joon was selected in the Honors category. Park founded POSCO FC in 1973 as a semipro club, a decade before the start of professional football, and in 1990, built the country's first football-only stadium, Pohang Steel Yard, in Pohang, about 380 kilometers southeast of Seoul.
Park opened another football stadium in Gwangyang, some 300 kilometers south of Seoul, and launched a new professional club based there, Jeonnam Dragons.
To be eligible for the Hall of Fame, a player must meet one of the following criteria: 300 matches in the top division, 100 goals scored for an outfield player, 100 clean sheets for a goalkeeper, a league goal scoring title or an assist title, a place on the season-end Best XI Team and a league MVP award.
For the inaugural class, the six-member Hall of Fame Selection Committee named 15 nominees for each decade. A vote by the committee, club representatives, media and fans determined the four inductees in the Stars category.
The selection committee picked the inductees in the Leaders and Honors categories.
Source: Yonhap News Agency