02/07/2025
When Gwangju FC, Korea’s hottest pro football underdogs, found itself broke despite a Cinderella run to the AFC Champions League quarterfinals, a flamboyant pop star with a mohawk and a mic stepped in to help — by opening a donation account.
The club, based in South Jeolla’s capital, recently breached the K League’s financial health regulations, which prohibit teams from spending more than their annual revenue. As a result, the K League handed down a one-year ban on new player signings, suspended until 2027 on the condition that the club improves its finances.
Over the past two years, Gwangju FC has racked up a 4.1 billion won ($3.21 million) deficit — 2.3 billion won last year and another 1.8 billion this year — leaving the club in a state of capital erosion and under serious fiscal strain.
That’s when Jobin, half of quirky musical duo Norazo and an unabashed Gwangju FC superfan, took action.
The eccentric singer — whose look was already retro when the group debuted in the mid-2000s — couldn't follow in the footsteps of global music icons like Elton John and Ed Sheeran, both of whom own, or have owned, significant chunks of their favorite football clubs. All K League clubs are owned by either a corporation or a municipal or provincial government, and Jobin, for all his success, is neither.
Instead, he turned his star power to the next best thing — fund-raising.
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(Photo: JoongAng Ilbo, Screen capture, Ilgan Sports)
