The 107th Korean National Sports Festival will take place in Jeju-do next month, with eleven teams competing for the trophy in the women’s football competition. Matches will be held in Seogwipo from 17th-22nd October.
Seven WK League sides will take part in the tournament, as well as four university teams. Sejong Sportstoto will be the only WK League club absent from this year’s National Sports Festival, having been beaten by Korea University earlier this year in a playoff to determne which team would represent Sejong at the event. The minor indignity of losing out to one of the country’s strongest youth sides may yield an advantage for Sportstoto, as the club can focus its efforts on the league, where the championship playoff is still within reach.
There will be just two rounds of the regular league left to play by the time the National Sports Festival kicks off, and some teams at the top and bottom ends of the table will know their final positions with a degree of certainty. For the teams at the top, the festival is this season’s first opportunity to take home some silverware, and to take the first step towards a repeat of Hwacheon KSPO’s 2025 treble. At the same time, with several important fixtures coming up, including the WK League playoff and championship final, the W Korea Cup semifinals and final, and (for Hwacheon) the AWCL group stage, managers and coaching staff will have to consider their clubs’ longer-term strategy and season aims when approaching this tournament.
For Gangjin Swans and Incheon Hyundai, teams for whom the WK League playoff is already out of reach, a good performance at the National Sports Festival could be the silver lining to an otherwise disappointing season. With less to play for elsewhere, these sides can afford to put out a full-strength squad and give it all they have in pursuit of a domestic title. As for the teams still in playoff contention by the time the festival comes around, there may be trickier tactical decisions to make about where priorities lie.
With WK League clubs and university teams competing in the same category for the first time at this event, and with some degree of squad rotation inevitable as managers prepare for the season climax, the National Sports Festival can throw up some unpredictable clashes and unexpected results. For even more women’s football action, there will also be an under-18 tournament at the National Sports Festival. Matches will streamed live via YouTube.
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