A tale of two Uniteds

Asia is accustomed to hosting teams from Europe. Every summer sees big clubs from the west heading east to play exhibition games in attempts to win new fans and conquer new markets.

The likes of Real Madrid, Liverpool, Manchester United, Chelsea, Bayern Munich, Roma and Juventus have all paid visits to the world's largest continent in recent years. After all, over half of the planet's soccer fans call Asia home.

There is something slightly special happening this month, however, with two teams from Manchester visiting the Land of the Morning Calm. One is English champion, European Champions League runner-up, FIFA Club World Cup winner and all-round general behemoth, Manchester United. The other is a fan-led team just four years old, and is in England's seventh tier.

The English champions have won 18 domestic and three continental titles and are one of the biggest, if not the biggest, clubs in the world. They also boast one of Korea's favorite sporting stars, Park Ji-sung.

United are in action on July 24 against K-League club FC Seoul at Seoul World Cup Stadium in a game that is a 64,000 seat sell-out.

Six days before that however, a team from England's seventh tier is in action against one from Korea's third division. FC United of Manchester faces Bucheon 1995. FC United was formed in 2005 by disillusioned fans of Manchester United. These followers took action after the club was taken over by American businessman Malcolm Glazer in 2005, another stage in what was, according to these supporters, a move away from the club's Manchester roots and fan-base.

FC United is run "by the fans for the fans." Starting all the way down in England's tenth tier, the club has climbed up to the seventh rung of the ladder and is regularly watched by 3,000 fans. Ahead of next season, the club announced on its website recently that each fan could choose what they paid for the season ticket that will grant entry to all home games. The same home page could also hardly contain its excitement at the all-expenses-paid trip to Korea. "This is an amazing opportunity for FC United and we're honored to be able to feature in a game against a fans-owned club with similar founding principles to our own," it said.

As the site says, Bucheon 1995 was also set up by fans whose club was literally taken away. SK Bucheon FC was a K-league team that had been struggling in the lower reaches for some years. Those fans woke up one morning in February 2006, a month before the start of the new season, to find that owners SK Energy, an arm of the giant SK conglomerate, had decided to move the club to the southern island of Jeju. This new team, Jeju United, was to utilize the last of the vacant stadiums built for the 2002 World Cup. It hasn't exactly been a successful move, and the island incantation of the team has fared little better in terms of points collected and fans attracted.

But the fans left behind channeled their anger into setting up their own club. It wasn't an easy process but it has been handled skillfully and professionally. The club is in Korea's K-3 League and has sponsorship deals and media exposure that most of its rivals can only dream of, with deals with media portal Daum and SK Telecom.

The match with FC United, which takes place at Bucheon Sports Complex Stadium on July 18, is an interesting one. As of July 12, 15,000 tickets had been sold and between 20-25,000 are expected on the night.

At the very least, it will be a fun night for all involved and a great opportunity for lower league English players to play a match in East Asia. And if it raises profiles as well as questions as to how the beautiful game operates in the respective countries, so much the better.

(johnduerden@hotmail.com)

By John Duerden /Contributing writer