- Video
-
Club Roar
Captured a great grassroots sporting moment? We want to see it!Content Collections
The Roar Community
- Join
- Login
South Korean clubs are actively recruiting Australian A-League players ahead of next month’s AFC Champions League, an agent told Monday’s Sydney Morning Herald newspaper.
With a new three-plus-one rule coming into effect in the Champions League, which allows for an extra player from within the Asian Football Confederation to be not counted as a foreigner, the Australian market has become an attractive proposition.
“The interest in Australia has increased dramatically and clubs across Asia have been looking at the success of Australian players and wondering how they could get them,” FIFA-accredited agent Song Sung-keun told the paper.
“Now they can, and A-League players are a lot cheaper than elsewhere because of their salary cap. But the money on offer in Japan or Korea is often double or triple what they are earning here.
“Clubs are calling me and telling me what type of player they want. I’ll look through the A-League and then we’ll see if the player wants to go. They nearly always do.”
Song said defenders were a priority for cash-rich Korean clubs.
“Centre-backs are what they want and also the wing-backs. It started with Jade North going to Incheon, now there’s Sasa Ognenovski to Seongnam, and it will keep going,” he said.
Song nominated Sydney FC trio Iain Fyfe, Rhyan Grant and Stuart Musialik, along with Adelaide United’s Scott Jamieson and Melbourne’s Roddy Vargas, as targets for Korean clubs.
He said South Korea could also prove an unlikely ice-breaker for Australian players into Japan’s J-League.
“Many players who come through the K-League will end up in Japan,” he said.
Are you the ultimate team manager? Pick your own superstar team and go head to head with other football fans for glory and cash prizes on Draftstars. Imagine what you could be buying instead. Set a deposit limit.