It’s a strange thing.
North Korea’s women’s soccer team is known as a “world beater” in age-group competitions, but once it reaches the adult level, it turns into a second-rate team.
This is why it will be interesting to see how the North Korean women’s soccer team fares in the coming years.
North Korea’s women’s soccer team won the U-20 World Cup last month, followed by the U-17 World Cup, 토토사이트 which concluded on Thursday.
The North Korean U-17 women’s national team won the FIFA U-17 Women’s World Cup 2024 final at the Estadio Olimpico Felix Sanchez in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, on Thursday, defeating Spain 4-3 in penalty kicks after a scoreless first and second 90 minutes.
It was the third U-17 Women’s World Cup title in eight years, following the 2008 and 2016 titles. Spain, winners of the last two U-17 Women’s World Cups, were literally on top of their game, while North Korea, who had a blistering run to the semifinals, struggled in terms of substance, but were able to rely on goalkeeper Park Ju-kyung to secure a penalty shootout victory.
After a 0-0 first half, North Korea conceded the opening goal in the 16th minute of the second half, but three minutes later, after a long pass from Ro Won-hyang, reigning tournament MVP Jeon Il-cheong found the back of the net with a right-footed shot to level the score at 1-1, and then smiled in the penalty shootout.
North Korea’s women’s soccer team, which hadn’t played an international match in more than three years due to Covid-19 since the beginning of 2020, proved that their skills on the international stage were not rusty.
Not only were the North Koreans physically no match for their European and American counterparts, but their speed and sheer volume of activity made them play like an adult women’s team in an age-group competition.
At the U-17 Women’s World Cup, North Korea scored 14 goals and conceded just two in six games to win the tournament in its first appearance in six years.
North Korea’s women’s soccer team also won the U-20 World Cup in Colombia a month earlier. Unlike the U-17 World Cup, which featured 16 nations, the U-20 World Cup featured 24 nations, and the North Koreans left jaws dropping as they won all seven of their matches, scoring 25 goals and conceding only four.
Furthermore, the U-20 World Cup MVP, Choi Il-sun, was born in 2007 and participated in the U-17 World Cup at the same time, so it’s hard to imagine how much potential these youngsters have.
In a way, it’s a mystery. In age-group competitions, they dominate all of the top women’s soccer powers in the U.S., Japan, and Europe, winning or finishing in the top 10, but when they put on the senior national team jersey, their performance drops off and they fail to make the cut.
North Korea has qualified for the Women’s World Cup four times in the past nine editions, from 1991 in China to last year’s tournament in Australia and New Zealand, but has never won.
Their most recent appearance was in Germany in 2011, and until last year, they had not competed in the Women’s World Cup for 12 years. The German tournament was a disgrace, with a number of players testing positive for doping, leading to a ban from the next tournament in 2015 in the United States, and the 2019 Women’s World Cup in France, where they were eliminated early by South Korea after hosting the first Asian qualifier in Pyongyang.
Last year’s tournament was canceled due to COVID-19.
In the previous four editions of the tournament, the team hasn’t fared well. They have been eliminated in the group stage three times and reached the quarterfinals in 2007 in China, where they lost 0-3 to Germany.
North Korea has a strong interest in and investment in women’s soccer, with athletic girls preferring to play the sport.
However, the country struggles in the Women’s World Cup because its teenage players are slow to develop and their skills are not as advanced once they reach the senior national team. The speed that was so great as a teenager doesn’t translate to the adult stage.
In addition, some have pointed out that the year of birth of North Korean players seems to be unclear.
The lack of development and suspicions about their age are the main reasons why North Korean women’s soccer is viewed from the outside.
In some cases, such as Seung Hyang-sim, who excelled at the U-20 Women’s World Cup in 2016 at the age of 17, she was quickly promoted to the senior national team the following year, but was criticized for not improving as time went on.
Now that North Korea has won the U-17 Women’s World Cup and the U-20 Women’s World Cup for the second time in its history, eight years after 2016, the team needs to prove that these talents will translate to the adult stage.