The soccer entertainment program ‘Shooting Star’ drew a line by saying it was “different” from the baseball entertainment program ‘Strongest Baseball’.

The two programs each feature the sports of soccer and baseball, and the fact that they feature retired and active players has drawn attention as interest in ‘similarities’.

The production team of Coupang Play‘s new entertainment program ‘Shooting Star’ held a press conference at the Stanford Hotel in Sangam-dong, Seoul on the afternoon of the 14th and said, “We think ‘Strongest Baseball’ is a successful program because its sincerity touches us,” and added, “We need to learn good things, but in any case, we have to collide with our bodies, sweat, and consume a lot of physical strength, and soccer has many basic characteristics, so it’s most important to express reality well within our characteristics.”

The program was directed by hitmaker Jo Hyo-jin of ‘Running Man’, ‘The Culprit is You!’, and ‘The Zone: Hang In There to Survive.’.

Director Jo said, “Rather than doing it consciously, I wanted to show what the unique sincerity of soccer is among the many sports entertainment programs.”

He continued, “If you ask me whether the genre is documentary or entertainment, I think it‘s mixed,” and emphasized, “These days, the overall trend in programs is that it’s meaningless to distinguish between them. What we want to do is a sports reality show that has a good mix of emotion and humor.”

’Shooting Star’ is a growth soccer entertainment show where Park Ji-sung and Choi Yong-soo take on the roles of team manager and coach, respectively, and challenge themselves in the K-League once again. Together with them, Seol Ki-hyun appears as a coach and creates a new soccer team, ‘FC Shooting Star’, and depicts the process of them challenging the ‘K4 League’, a fourth-tier soccer league.

FC Shooting Star contains the meaning that the legends who made Korean soccer shine come together to “take a shot” once again.

It seems that it will be quite entertaining to see the passion and competitive spirit of retired K-League players, such as captain Kim Young-kwang, Yeom Ki-hun, and Go Yo-han Dejan.



Reporter Lee Jeong-yeon annjoy@donga.com