What Future Has in Store for Korean Tender

"We have gone through a lot. Now we feel nothing."

The basketball players and staff members of the Korean Tender were watching deep into the night the broadcast of the final vote, determining the city that would host the 2010 World Expo. At around the midnight, they just left for their rooms, with disappointment on their faces.

The company that owned the team severed its relationship with the team. Without any financial help, the team has just kept itself above water by "selling" star players to other teams. But yet another crisis is looming over the team. Yeosu City promised to give it a financial aid, once the city was selected as the hosting city of the World Expo. With Yeosu losing the bid, the team has lost the money.

Now two organizations are making efforts to resuscitate the team: one is the office of the club that the team belongs to; the other is an organization consisting of Yeosu residents.

The two bodies held an emergency meeting on yesterday morning, once it became certain that the city would not host the exposition. They will hold a fund-raising drive on Dec. 7th. They plan to sell 5,000 tickets, one for \10,000, to Yeosu residents and local luminaries. Once the money is collected, they will pay overdue bills for the team.

What they are really aiming at is the advertiser recruitment activity scheduled for Dec. 10th. In the recruitment, they will court owners of factories located in the Yeuso Industrial Complex to put ads on the uniforms, floor of the gym and placards of the team. Once the activity goes through as planned, \500 million can be made, an amount just enough to put the team through this season.

In addition, they are also aggressively finding a local company that could buy the team.

Lee Sang-hoon, a senior member of the residents` body, "Korean Tender has contributed a lot to our community. It has prevented young teens from going astray, and provided residents a good pastime. If no company comes out to buy this by the end of this season, we will make a consortium to run the team, making it a public team of local residents."

Jong-Seok Kim Sang-Ho Kim kjs0123@donga.com hyangsan@donga.com