North Korean team may be punished
North Korean players are handsomely rewarded with coveted apartments if they win internationally but are punished, some sent to coal mines, if they lose.
Unpredictability is North Korea's secret weapon
A week after arriving for the World Cup, the North Korean team remains largely hidden from public view, sequestered behind the tightly guarded gates of a remote hotel in northern Johannesburg that seems to rise like a fortress from the South African veld.
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The 23 men training in Tembisa are their country’s most visible ambassadors, among the few North Koreans allowed to travel overseas.
At home, they’re already heroes, bestowed with medals and merit citations and honored on postage stamps unveiled last week to commemorate the team’s success in qualifying for the World Cup.
With that honour comes pressure. Moon Ki-nam, a former national-level North Korea coach who defected to South Korea in 2004, said players are handsomely rewarded with coveted apartments if they win internationally but are punished, some sent to coal mines, if they lose.
Even some of the feted players from the 1966 team were said to have been sent to one of North Korea’s infamous labor camps for squandering a promising 3-0 lead to lose to a Eusebio-led Portugal in the quarterfinals.
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read more here: http://www.timeslive.co.za/sport/soccer/article497340.ece/World-Cup-play...
North Korea's World Cup coach punished, demoted to builder
North Korea's football coach Kim Jong-Hun was put to shame and punished by being sentenced to forced labor as a builder after his team lost every World Cup match.
According to Sky News, the coach and his team were interrogated by 400 Communist party officials for six hours at the People's Palace of Culture upon returning home from their humiliating losses in South Africa's World Cup games.
http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/295359
Colt - I posted it just 4 Soniya's eyes..you backoff!!
BTW..where is sweet soniya today??
guy from left really must be enjoying the moment.
No one asked for your wise ass comments... shut up and get back to work! :-P
I can see Baichung Bhutia in each 1 of them :-)
Let's hope, for their own good, they do well with CIV!
What they achieved this time is commendable,they managed to qualify to the world cup and they even tested brazil as well!
I doubt they will be punished this time though losing 7-0 won't have gone down well but they held their own against Brazil and a decent result against CIV will ensure a smooth return home.
Thats bad...how can they play under such pressure..
Indian cricket borad should follow them..:) lol
It's ironic that North Korea is playing in a country that was banned from the Rugby World Cup for the aparthied regime, yet, they, a team from a country that is one of the most aggressive dictatorships in the world that has recently purposely sunk a South Korean warship & killed 3 Chinese boarder guards, not to mention made countless threats of nuclear annialation against the US & Japan, nto to mention a homegrown policy of secret police, torture and starvation against it's own people is allowed to play in the Football World Cup....
Look at the pic , Are they gays? ;)