The South Korean national soccer team has parted ways with its training home, Paju NFC, for the time being. The team will not enter Paju NFC for the time being, as the contract is about to expire.
The contract between the Korea Football Association and Paju NFC is coming to an end. The Paju NFC, which opened in 2001, will end its lease with the Korea Football Association at the end of January next year. According to various reports, the KFA will have to pay a hefty 2.6 billion won in rent every year after the end of January if they use the Paju NFC. This is literally the level of rent, and if you add various expenses such as facility maintenance costs, the bleeding of funds will become even more severe.
A related issue is that the South Korean national football team, which is preparing for the 2026 FIFA North America Cup Asia Second Qualifying Round at home against Singapore on November 16 and away to China at Shenzhen University Sports Park on November 21, is temporarily using Mokdong Sports Complex as a training center instead of Paju NFC. Since the launch of the Paju NFC, the national team, which used to have its own training facility and lodging, has been preparing for matches by convening in hotels, a practice that was only seen in the 1990s.
“Paju NFC is a contract until this year, and it takes about two years to get into the Cheonan Football Center,” said a national team official. So we are in talks with Paju City to extend the contract for another two years,” he said, introducing the current situation. 토토사이트
“First of all, the facilities are very old and the grass needs to be cut once. So even if we sign an extension contract with Paju City, we can’t use Paju NFC right now. After the two-game series in November, we have to prepare for the 2023 AFC Qatar Asian Cup in Korea from the end of December, but we can’t do it in the capital because of the climate, so we will go down to Jeju or Ulsan to train. The A team will not enter the Paju NFC for the time being,” he explained.
“We will decide if we will enter Paju next year based on the situation. For the time being, the national team will play their A matches in the vicinity of Seoul, so they can prepare for their matches in this way. It’s easy to get to the airport. However, the age groups can continue to play in Paju,” he said, noting that the A team will most likely train outside of Paju.
The Paju NFC is a facility in itself, as for the past 20 years it has been a place where only players who have been selected for the national team can come. But now, a whole new era seems to be dawning. A major soccer center is planned for Tian’an, and there are indications that not only training facilities but also administrative facilities will be moved. The herdsmen training is the beginning of that change.