Three decades are not a short period in a person’s lifetime. People’s Athlete Ri Un Gyong spent such a long time with football. Her colleagues say that not so many Korean women have played at the national football team for over ten years like Ri. She joined the national team when she was just over 20 years old. Since then, she had been active as midfielder for over a decade in the national women’s football team. At that time experts highly appraised her activities as both a playmaker and finisher. Because they largely attributed to her the successes of the DPRK squad at such international games as the 13th and 14th Asian women’s football championships and women’s football tournaments at the 14th and 15th Asian Games. “When I came to quit playing, I considered no other choice. I only thought of becoming a coach and train football aces,” recalled Un Gyong. She studied hard at Korea University of Physical Education with the passion she had displayed as a soccer player after ending her playing career and has worked as a coach for nearly 10 years since graduation. She recently switched to a futsal coach. “I’m going without hesitation out of a desire to contribute to exalting the honour of the country,” Un Gyong told her colleagues who expressed their regret about her parting from the team she had coached with so much effort and her selecting a new target of which she had not had good knowledge. Han Won Chol, soccer coach of the Kigwancha Sports Club, described her spirit of challenge knowing no standstill or satisfaction as an example all the sportspersons should follow. THE PYONGYANG TIMES 
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