[Official] Coach Kim Eun-jung to lead the LA Olympics national team... 'Semi-final myth' co-creator Coach Kim Tae-min joins

*This content was translated by AI.

Kim Eun-jung (47), the mastermind behind the 2023 FIFA U-20 World Cup semi-final myth, is taking charge of the South Korea Olympic men's team and embarking on a journey toward the 2028 LA Olympics.

The Korea Football Association announced on the 6th that it held its fourth board meeting at the Seoul Jongno-gu Football Hall and appointed former SuwonFC coach Kim Eun-jung as the head coach of the men's Olympic team. This appointment was made through an open recruitment process in which the coach and assistant coach applied as a single team. The team of Coach Kim Eun-jung and Coach Kim Tae-min received the highest scores from the Power Strengthening Committee and external members, was recommended as the top candidate, and was ultimately approved.

According to the Football Association, Coach Kim Eun-jung will take charge of the team starting from the June call-up once the contract is finalized and will begin building the team's system in earnest.

Coach Kim Eun-jung has built a long track record as a coach for the Yeon Ryeong-byeol (CEO) team. As a coach, he experienced winning the gold medal at the 2018 Jakarta-Palembang Asian Games and the 2020 AFC U-23 Asian Cup championship, and as a head coach, he achieved the great feat of reaching the semi-finals of the 2023 U-20 World Cup.

Subsequently, Coach Kim Eun-jung took over as the head coach of SuwonFC for the 2024 season, demonstrating the seasoned expertise of a first-year professional coach by leading the team to Final A with a fifth-place finish in K League 1. Although the team suffered relegation in the 2025 season and he terminated his contract with the club by mutual agreement in December of last year, the solid game management and ability to utilize promising young players that Coach Kim Eun-jung displayed at SuwonFC have been recognized by the football community.

The fantastic synergy between Coach Kim Eun-jung and his assistant coach, Kim Tae-min, is also an expected element. Coach Kim Tae-min, who served as an aide to Coach Park Hang-seo and shared in Vietnam's golden age of football, also co-created the semi-final myth with Coach Kim Eun-jung during the 2023 U-20 World Cup. It is reported that the Power Strengthening Committee gave high scores to the two coaches for their outstanding understanding of international tournaments at various age levels.

However, the environment for Coach Kim Eun-jung to qualify for the tournament finals is more difficult than ever. With the International Olympic Committee (IOC) recently accepting FIFA's proposal, the number of men's football participating countries at the LA Olympics has been significantly reduced from the existing 16 to 12. Consequently, the number of finals berths allocated to Asia has also decreased from 3.5 to 2.

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*This content was translated by AI.