There are always a handful of players who take full advantage of the World Cup, turning a few brilliant games into a big-money transfer that catapults them up the football food chain.
Perhaps Cho Gue-sung will be that player. But, at the very least, he has been catapulted into stardom.
To an extent it’s because of his play. He scored two goals in South Korea’s 3-2 loss to Ghana, marking a sudden and brilliant rise from relative anonymity in the K-League to starring alongside Son Heung-min.
But, let’s be frank, it’s also for another reason: his looks.
Welcome to the K-Pop-isation of football.
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If you’re on social media you’ll have at some point seen a name or term you don’t understand trending. Odds are it’s probably related to K-pop (korean pop music), whether it be a group, a solo artist, an awards show… or, for example, one member of a famous girl group showing off her forehead instead of donning bangs for the first time and overshadowing an Apple event.
You also might’ve seen fans posting videos of certain performers as replies to tweets – these are ‘fancams’, or videos solely of one group member performing a song on a TV show or concert. (K-pop groups can have well over a dozen members so these fancams ensure a fan’s favourite is always in the shot.)
There are also fancams which compile random moments of the artist, as a sort of musical highlight package, but typically focused on their appearance.
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How does this relate to Cho? Well, after his double against Ghana thrust him into the spotlight, he quickly went viral for a different football moment: sitting quietly on the bench during a Jeonbuk Motors game.
This video, posted by a Korean user with barely over 300 followers, has nearly eight million views at the time of publication. And, again, it’s just him sitting there… but doing so handsomely.
One tweet in reply stated: “When I first saw his Instagram account he had 40k, now he’s on one million in just a few days. Cho Gue-sung, the powerful man that you are! Thank you for the two beautiful goals and making history today, king. Now, accept my hand in marriage.”
More fancams continue to be created as the World Cup goes on.
Since the start of the World Cup, Cho has gone from roughly 20,000 Instagram followers to nearly two milion. He hadn’t posted for months until a new photo of him after the win over Portugal, which pushed South Korea into the round of 16, was uploaded (whether by him, or by a freshly-hired PR person).
The sort of K-pop-style fandom Cho is now receiving is a global trend, but it has long existed in Korea, as The Athletic reported this week.
“South Korean fans have been known to bestow superstar status on their footballers,” Devon Rowcliffe, author of Who Ate All the Squid? Football Adventures in South Korea, told the outlet.
“After the mania of the 2002 World Cup, midfielder Kim Nam-il became an overnight sex symbol. Female fans would hold up placards at matches with racy euphemisms, offering marriage proposals or less formal encounters.”
An incident involving Cho and Cristiano Ronaldo will only help his brand grow further; Cho reportedly learned Portuguese swear words so he could curse out Ronaldo following the match on Saturday morning.
“Before leaving the game, a South Korean player told me to leave the field immediately,” Ronaldo said.
“I told him to shut up. He has no authority, he doesn’t need to give an opinion.”
And while all of this may be superfluous to Cho’s actual football career, his on-field exploits are helping that develop, too.
The K-League’s top-scorer last season, Cho has been linked to multiple clubs including Ange Postecoglou’s Celtic, with the Aussie manager having previously found great success scouting in Asia – though typically Japan.
Asked about Cho as well as Canada’s Alistair Johnson, Postecoglou said: “We’re looking at a number of players. We are looking to get stronger and he (Johnston) is definitely one of the players on our radar.
“Hopefully there will be some developments in the near future and he can add something to our football club.”
