Towards a historic Asian Women’s Champions League semi-final between teams from the two Koreas

A semi-final for history. Tickets for the semi-final of the Asian Women’s Champions League scheduled to pit a women’s team from North Korea against a local club from South Korea this Wednesday, May 20, were completely sold out in half a day, the South Korean football federation told AFP on Friday.

7,000 tickets for the match, which will be played in the city of Suwon, about 35 kilometers south of Seoul between the North Korean women’s team of Naegohyang FC and the South Korean team of Suwon FC, were snapped up a dozen hours after they went on sale Tuesday, according to an official from the South Korean Federation.

This meeting will mark the first trip to the South since 2018 for a sports team from North Korea, a reclusive country with nuclear weapons. The two Koreas remain officially at war, the 1950-1953 conflict having ended in an armistice and not a peace treaty.

Both teams will stay in the same hotel

As the Champions League is a club competition, national flags and anthems will not be used during the match, according to local media. There will also be no fans from the North, as North Koreans are generally not allowed to travel to the South.

South Korean national security law prohibits possessing and waving a North Korean flag or playing its national anthem in public. South Koreans are also required to obtain approval from the Unification Ministry before making contact with any North Korean. But the travel of the North’s team having been authorized, as a government official reported to AFP, and it will not be illegal for the South Koreans, for example, to greet their opponents.

Naegohyang’s team is scheduled to arrive in South Korea on Sunday by plane from Beijing. The players and staff must stay in a hotel in Suwon, where the Suwon FC team must also take up residence. But the meal areas and the routes of the different teams will be distinct, reports the local press.

The winners will face the Australians from Melbourne City or the Japanese from Tokyo Verdy Beleza in the final, still in South Korea, on May 23.