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| ▲ This photo, shows Son Heung-min, the first Asian player to become the top scorer in the Premier League. (Yonhap) |
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| ▲ This photo, shows North Korea airing the English Premier League. (Yonhap) |
SEOUL, July 19 (Yonhap) --While North Korea recently aired highlights of the English Premier League (EPL), it was found that the game featuring Son Heung-min (30) was omitted.
According to Korean Central Television on Tuesday, the central television edited and broadcasted the English Premier League (EPL) 25-26 round for the 2021-2022 season on Sunday.
"The English Premier League is continuing, and the expectation and interest of many soccer enthusiasts have been excited to see which team will be winning this season," said the announcer of Korean Central Television. "We will be showing the highlight scenes of the 25th and 26th rounds of EPL."
It began with the highlights of the match between Norwich City and Manchester City, and ended with the match between Southampton and Everton. In the 27 minutes video, Tottenham Hotsupur, where Son Heung-min is playing, did not appear at all.
Considering the fact that Son Heung-min scored 23 goals in the EPL in the 2021-2022 season and became the first Asian player to become the top scorer in the Premier League, it is highly likely that North Korea deliberately deleted Tottenham matches, where Son Heung-min was included, to not let the North Koreans know about the accomplishments of South Korean athletes.
It has been analyzed that they have come to a conclusion that it is not good to inform the South Korean player's outstanding performance on the world stage as the international stage performance of the North Korean soccer team is poor despite North Korean's "love for soccer."
Till now, North Korea has not reported the progress of South Korean players in international competitions including the Olympics and the World Cup.
When South Korea reached the semifinals of the 2002 Korea-Japan World Cup, Ri Dong-gyu, director of the science department of the North Korean Institute of Sports Science, gave an exceptionally positive evaluation in an interview with the Chosun Shinbo, an official newspaper of the Korean Federation of Korean Residents in Japan as he commented, "The achievements of South Korea are the achievements of the Korean people."
When he said this in 2000, North Korea and South Korea were on good terms with the June 15th North-South Joint Declaration.
Meanwhile, North Korea has been recording and broadcasting major global sports events including soccer and tennis at least once a week since Kim Jong-il took power.
Particularly, since August 15, 2015, "Sports Television," a TV channel that specializes in sports has been launched and is airing every Saturday and Sunday from 7 p.m. till 10 p.m.
With the special interest of Kim Jong-un, who is also known as a "sports fanatic," it seems that he intends to use the popularization of sports as a means of solidarity.
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