Post-World Cup Checklist Part 2: Summer Transfers

In our post-World Cup to do list series we first looked at the upcoming all-important Asian Games. Now we turn our attention to the summer transfers:

1. 2026 Asian Games
2. Summer Transfers
3. Reforming the KFA… for real this time?
4. 2027 Asian Cup

The Asian Games post was a pessimistic one. This one… you could interpret as either hopeful or really sad considering how little transfer movement we have this window (thanks HMB…)

Confirmed transfers:

Just one. Lee Kang In to Atletico Madrid. Already “Here We Go” official from Fabrizio Romano and confirmed by all the high-level Atletico Madrid journalists, Spanish news outlets like Marca and AS, and reportedly, Simeone himself. To paraphrase what I already wrote last month:

And then Lee Kang In. Fabrizio Romano specifically has come out on livestream and X saying that Lee Kang In’s transfer will be one of the biggest to watch this transfer market. Right now, it seems Atletico Madrid is the front runner. For context, Atletico has long admired LKI; they have been chasing him since his Mallorca days. Their technical director Mateu Alemany is the guy who promoted LKI to Valencia’s first team from the Mestalla. Their CEO wants access to Korea’s market after seeing how football crazy Korea was during their very successful and very lucrative Korea tour last summer. And most importantly, Diego Simeone has long been an admirer since 2022-23 and sees Lee Kang In as a successor to Antoine Griezmann. According to Marca and Rubén Uría (very reliable reporter for Atletico), Simeone reportedly sees parallels between LKI and a young Antoine Griezmann – LKI is obviously talented, and his PSG teammates openly acknowledge him as the most technically gifted on the team, but not QUITE world class just yet. Simone sees LKI as someone he can mold into one of the best in the world, just as he transformed a very talented but not-yet household name in Griezmann, at the time playing as a winger for Real Sociedad, into one of the world’s best. It also helps that 1) Atletico is in dire need of a creative midfielder, with Griezmann retiring and Thiago Almada and Alex Baena struggling to fill the creative midfield role (Almada at least is reportedly set to leave the club), and 2) LKI can whip in crosses to Sorloth who is essentially an upgraded version of Vedat Muriqi and Cho Gue Sung, tall target men great at headers whom LKI has such great telepathy with. Atletico tried to sign him last summer as well as this past winter (their agents actually met with PSG in December and tried to work a deal) but each time Luis Enrique reportedly blocked the deal (then proceeds to give LKI 0 minutes in the Champions League final…)

The only updates so far are as follows:

• The transfer fee is 40 million euros + add ons. This puts LKI at the 2nd highest Korean transfer to date, just behind Kim Min Jae’s 50 million transfer to Bayern, and just ahead of Son Heung Min’s 30 million transfer to Tottenham.
• It’s funny how the initial transfer fee was supposedly 25 million plus add ons, but the number being reported kept creeping up and up, mostly due to LKI’s performance vs Czechia as well as typical greed on PSG’s end. Screw you PSG, now you are the most hated club from the diehard Korean fan camp
• As LKI is being acquired as the Griezmann successor, he will likely take #7. Julian Alvarez already has #19, and Alex Baena who will likely stay already has #10. However this is just speculation from insiders; nothing is official.
• The reason why the official announcement hasn’t happened yet on Atletico’s end is because PSG is dragging their feet on sending over the required paperwork. These a**holes are reportedly more preoccupied with the transfer of Akliouche from Monaco but he’s kind of contesting a World Cup right now, hence why things are slow. But Urias and Romano are saying the negotiations are fully finalized and there’s no risk of anything changing, just that PSG is being really slow.

Will Lee Kang In finally get regular playing time? Most likely, yes, or at least he will have plenty of time to prove himself. He is coming on as Atletico’s 9th-10th most expensive signing, he is explicitly being signed as Griezmann’s replacement (since the team no longer has a creative attacking midfielder), and Simeone was reportedly quoted saying he is happy that LKI can play “4 different positions” presumably behind the striker, LM, CM, and RM. The former two I believe is most likely considering Atleti have strong CMs already, and Giuliano Simeone is a lock at the RM position (unless he is rested, LKI won’t play there and can’t play the up and down pitch role Simeone Jr. does). I believe Diego Simeone is someone who can polish LKI and utilize his strengths to turn him into someone acknowledged by everyone as world class.

So yeah. That’s our only confirmed transfer, while our islander rivals send like 10 people to Europe from the J League every transfer season. Now we move onto the rumored transfers, in rough order of what I believe is most likely to least likely:

Lee Han Beom: Considering that he was a KNT standout (fwiw…) and his contract is expiring next year and the Midtjylland sporting director has confirmed that offers are already coming in from “big clubs” (whatever that means)… Lee Han Beom is looking like a relative surefire transfer this summer. I also touched upon this last month, and there have been no updates since then (just random rumors here and there without anything concrete) so I’ll just quote myself again:

Lee Han Beom I have ALWAYS said is our second-best defender in the KNT. Some people didn’t believe me, and I feel kind of vindicated now. He is clearly a VERY good CB, performed near flawlessly against Czechia and Mexico, and is looking like one of our “breakout stars” per se alongside Lee Gi Hyeok, who I also really hope will move to Europe this summer.

Lots of transfer rumors right now regarding LHB, confirmed by an interview from Midtjylland’s sporting director. LHB has only 1 year left on his contract so there is a very high chance that he will indeed leave this summer (otherwise he can refuse an extension and leave on a free). The Midtylland sporting director didn’t specifically name any clubs, but there are lots of clubs being thrown around by various news outlets with the ones I’ve seen being Liverpool, Chelsea, and Leeds. The one that seems most concrete so far is from an Italian source Il Mattino (from my cursory Googling quite credible) claiming that Napoli is interested in LHB alongside a few other defenders like Lucas Herrington of Australia/Colorado Rapids (MLS) and Federico Gatti of Italy/Juventus. Would be really cool to see him at Napoli following in the footsteps of his idol! And yes, I used that word intentionally – in the Shoot for Love interviews with LHB during their Man in Europe campaign where Park Ji Sung and Patrice Evra went around to KPA clubs handing out free Korean coffee and snacks, he very specifically named KMJ as his idol and says he watches KMJ highlights as inspiration before games.

Hwang Hee Chan: nothing coming up recently, but after Wolverhampton’s relegation was confirmed, there were links to Fulham, Brentford, and the stronger teams in Turkey (Fener, Gala). Nothing has really surfaced post World Cup (see I told you this post could get kind of depressing) but considering that Wolves got relegated, there is a strong chance he will eventually leave this summer.

Bae Jun Ho – three years at Stoke City, crowned the “king” by fans, and 125 league appearances at just age 22 – now BJH, very unfortunately injured during the World Cup group stage, is at the last year of his contract. After his breakout at the U20 Asian Cup, a ton of teams including PSV and even Arsenal were supposedly looking to sign him, but he (wisely in my opinion) chose regular playing time at Stoke City where he quickly evolved into one of, if not the best player on the team. From the news articles coming out it seems that BJH will likely not renew, and that Stoke would rather sell him this season than lose him on a free the next. There are no clubs specified in the media yet. But it seems that there is a good chance he will move. It would’ve been great if he hadn’t been injured and we actually played well in the World Cup, but it is what it is…

Seol Young Woo: rumors had been circling for at least two years now? That he would leave Serbia soon? He is one of the team’s star players, has one of the highest transfermarkt values on the team, and plays a coveted position that is in short supply. The interested teams last year were Sheffield United in the Championship and FSV Mainz in the Bundesliga, and this year it’s Eintracht Frankfurt who is reportedly trying to sign Seol after the departure of Nathaniel Brown to Bayern Munich (surfaced back in the January transfer window, not just this summer). Not sure how credible or concrete any of this is but a move does seem to be on the horizon.

Oh Hyeon Gyu: after a blistering start to life in Turkey in 2/2026, with a goal a game his first month and eventually getting 8 in 16 games over just a half-season, transfer rumors kept rolling in for this guy. Let’s review his rollercoaster club situation over the past year:

• Summer of 2025: Stuttgart and Fulham reportedly trying to sign him from Belgium
• late Summer 2025: Stuttgart actually agrees a deal with Genk, personal terms with OHG. Only the medical is left. But for some reason, Oh fails the medical (unheard of in football for those unaware) because of some knee surgery he had in the past. Oh Hyeon Gyu starts pointing to his knee after scoring goals in Belgium
• January 2026: Fulham puts in an offer, but Oh chooses Beşiktaş; done deal as of 2/4/2026. Fans are very confused why he went to Turkey instead of going to the English Premier League or the Bundesliga. Also confused why he signed a long term 3.5 year contract that would take him to age 28. Does the dude want to play his prime years in Turkiye (no offense Turkiye is great, we’d love more KPAs there, and we Koreans have a great relationship with Turkiye as a country but understandably, we are a little puzzled when it seems he had chances at the top of the top leagues).
• First month at Beşiktaş: debut goal with a bicycle kick, scores world class goals outside of the box and from volleys, scores 4 games in a row (or was it 5?)
• Summer of 2026: scores his first World Cup goal.
• Also summer of 2026: the Beşiktaş manager who brought in OHG (Sergen Yalçın) is sacked and replaced with a guy named Italiano – Vincenzo Italiano – who reportedly is trying very hard to sign a new CF. The top priority is reportedly Dušan Vlahović…

So that’s where we’re at. Before the World Cup, we saw some wild news. Apparently, Manchester United and Tottenham were trying to sign him in the summer – surely too big of a move up. After the World Cup we’re reportedly seeing interest from Atletico Madrid (yeah… no…) and the most credible so far, newly promoted Hull City FC. Newly promoted teams are a bit hit or miss considering they have a chance of immediately getting relegated again, but of all the recent links so far, it’s likely at Hull where OHG would see the most playing time.

OHG surprises us every transfer window so who knows what could happen? He could leave because of the new manager situation (who apparently prefers a different style of CF seeing as he is going after Vlahovic), or he could stay because reportedly he is a fan and board favorite at Beşiktaş and there are also numerous news outlets saying Beşiktaş will not sell.

Hwang In Beom – our journeyman finds himself at the center of several rumors including Real Betis, FC Porto, and Monterrey (lol) as of late. He only has two seasons under his belt at Feyenoord so his contract isn’t expiring anytime soon, he was trusted by Robin van Persie as the team’s ace in attacking mid (we’ll see if van Bronckhorst rates him highly too), and Feyenoord plays Champions League. I don’t think he’s in any rush but his excellent performance vs Czechia might put him on the radar and who knows maybe he finally wants to challenge himself in a top 4 league.

Paik Seung Ho – one of the best players on the squad at Birmingham, reportedly has interest from newly promoted Coventry City after a dominating season in the 2nd division. Who knows how real this is and if PSH even wants to move though. His contract isn’t expiring until 2028.

Jens Castrop – this is a speculative one but there are rumors Champions League side Stuttgart might want to sign Jens this summer. Personally don’t think this one will happen considering Jens just moved to Gladbach and will want to cement his starting berth for a full season first.

Kim Min Su – another big-time speculative rumor but there are several news outlets (all from some West Ham insider source) claiming West Ham is trying to sign Minsu after his breakout season in the Spanish Segunda Division. Doesn’t seem like the brightest move when he is still only 20 years old and is likely going to be a regular starter for Girona after their relegation to the second division.

Kim Min Jae? Reports that while KMJ is content as the (currently) third choice CB at Bayern (I am very much not but that’s a discussion for another time), there are rumors that Luciano Spalletti (his old Napoli boss) now at Juventus wants to sign him, as do Manchester United and various clubs in Turkey. Not everyone will agree with me but I think that out of these options, fighting it out at Bayern is best. Man United and Juventus are equal or bigger clubs than Bayern historically but Juve is Europa League and Man U is rebuilding. KMJ was a starter for 2 seasons at Bayern (just not his last) and although German media love to scapegoat the Asian guy he is clearly good enough to be a starter at Bayern, even though they’ll always favor the German national football team vice captain over him.

Lee Gi Hyeok – nothing concrete reported, but I’ve repeatedly mentioned on the Tavern that he is more than good enough for Europe and should be looking to move soon.

Loan Movement:

Kim Ji Soo: all reports point towards Brentford rating Kim Ji Soo very highly and eventually they want him at the club as their future CB. Director of Football Phil Giles publicly said so in an interview earlier this year. Don’t forget, this guy already has 3 Premier League sub appearances and had a very successful season at Kaiserslautern before injury. The question is, will he stay with Brentford this season? Or will he be loaned out again (more likely)? And if so, where? We don’t know yet.

Yoon Do Young: From Brighton, first to Excelsior (Eredivisie), then Dordrecht (Netherlands 2nd division), now confirmed that he will be at FC Magdeburg (2.Bundesliga) for the 2026-27 season. Hopefully this is his breakout season – he did okay at Dordrecht, but he’s only 19 and has some growing to do.

Yang Min Hyeok: after a relatively successful time at Portsmouth where he started fairly regularly (not 100% but still) and scored some absolute bangers, he had a very bad time at Coventry where Frank Lampard essentially never used him. He will almost surely be loaned out again (this is the typical EPL model – sign big talents early, loan them out to smaller leagues, see if they survive). Like Kim Ji Soo, we are still waiting on where he will go next.