Heungkuk Life Insurance’s coach Kwon Soon-chan’s controversy over the sacking is causing a nuisance to the entire V-League beyond the club. The manager who led the second place was suddenly dismissed, and an unprecedented situation occurred in which the acting manager took the helm of the league’s biggest festival, the All-Star Game.
The Korea Volleyball Federation (KOVO) will hold the Dodram 2022-2023 V-League All-Star Game at Incheon Samsan World Gymnasium on the 29th. Since the All-Star Game is a festival of stars, it has received great attention from volleyball fans since the end of last year. With the return of ‘Volleyball Empress’ Kim Yeon-kyung (Heungkuk Life Insurance), the popularity of the women’s division reached its peak, and the men’s division also had a fierce ranking fight and a large number of rising stars appeared. KOVO conceived and planned more events than any other All-Star Game.
However, while preparing for the event, an unexpected setback occurred. Failing to find a command tower to lead the women’s Z-Star team. As for the team command tower in the All-Star Game, based on the third round, the coach of the first-place team takes the M-star command, and the coach of the second-place team takes the baton of the Z-star. As a result, M-Star in the women’s division was taken over by head coach Seong-hyung Kang of Hyundai E&C, but the Z-star command tower became vacant due to the replacement of coach Soon-chan Kwon of Heungkuk Life Insurance, who ranked second. 안전놀이터
On the 2nd, Heungkuk Life Insurance suddenly dismissed coach Kwon Soon-chan, who had established a second-team system with leading Hyundai Engineering & Construction. It was coach Kwon who was unjustly burdened in the unprecedented situation of the leadership intervening in the game. Afterwards, even head coach Lee Young-soo, who assisted Kwon, left the team after playing against GS Caltex on the 5th as acting coach, and coach Kim Dae-kyung, born in 1987, took the helm from the IBK Industrial Bank game on the 8th.
According to the principle, acting head coach Kim Dae-kyung should be in charge of the Z-Star team for the All-Star Game. Although his status is acting manager, this is because the current leader of second-place Heungkuk Life Insurance is acting manager Kim. An official from KOVO told OSEN, “An acting supervisor is definitely a supervisor. Therefore, it is right for him to be the manager of the All-Star Game.”
However, acting Kim turned down the All-Star Game coaching offer. Since the acting manager was a position that he was forced to take on due to the club’s unreasonable administration, it was natural to give up in a way. Acting Kim is only leading the team for the sake of the players, with coach Kwon Soon-chan and head coach Lee Young-soo leaving the team, and coach Kim Ki-joong, who was scheduled to be appointed, expressing his gratitude.
In the end, after being persuaded by the federation and the club, Acting Kim took over as the command tower for the Z-Star team in the All-Star Game. His expression was not bright. Acting Kim, who we met in Incheon on the 25th, confessed, “I was very stressed when I heard that I had to go to the All-Star game.” “But they said there was no other way. I am currently feeling a lot of pressure.”
Acting Kim was the third leader following head coach Kwon Soon-chan and head coach Lee Young-soo. He was in the middle of gaining field experience as a coach. Of course, he retired at an early age and took over as a leader from the 2013-2014 season, but he is only 36 years old, one year older than Kim Yeon-kyung. It is natural for him to be burdened as he has gone beyond acting manager and is in charge of the All-Star game. It would not have been very pleasant for the team to represent the festival in a chaotic situation. Nonetheless, it is Acting Kim who decided to sacrifice once again for the fans and the league.
Contrary to concerns, Acting Kim is quickly reviving the team atmosphere and maintaining second place in the regular league. After taking office, he recorded 3 wins and 2 losses in 5 games with a win rate of over 50%. Acting Kim said, “Coach and acting manager are completely different. I want to pay respect to the V-League coaches. Everyone must be stressed out, but you seem to be great,” he paid his respects to the other directors.
He also expressed respect for the former leader who left after laying the groundwork to maintain the second round despite the chaos. Acting Kim said, “I think the season is running well (even after the two leave) because I trained well with coach Kwon Soon-chan and head coach Lee Young-soo during the off-season.”