Hong Myung-bo stepped down as head coach of South Korea's men's national football team on Sunday, a day after the side was eliminated from the 2026 FIFA World Cup in Mexico. Reading from a prepared statement at a press conference in Zapopan, a city in the western Mexican state of Jalisco, the 57-year-old took full responsibility for the team's failure. "We didn't deliver the results that our fans expected, and the responsibility rests entirely with me as head coach," he said.

South Korea finished third in Group A — which also included co-hosts Mexico, the Czech Republic and South Africa — with three points from one win and two losses. In the expanded 48-team tournament format, the eight best third-place teams advance to the round of 32, but South Korea, who began promisingly with a 2-1 comeback victory over the Czech Republic, lost 1-0 to Mexico and then suffered a shock 1-0 defeat to lower-ranked South Africa in their final group match. That last result left them 10th among the 12 third-place nations, well outside the qualification threshold. Hong acknowledged the South Africa game was the team's worst performance of the tournament, and drew particular criticism for dropping captain Son Heung-min — who turns 34 next month and had previously hinted at retiring from international duty — for that decisive fixture.

Hong's exit has done little to quiet the anger at home, which is directed less at the coach himself than at the Korea Football Association (KFA) that appointed him. Hong was hired in July 2024 for his second stint in charge — his first had also ended at the group stage, at the 2014 World Cup in Brazil — under circumstances that sparked immediate controversy. Critics questioned the transparency of a process in which the KFA bypassed several foreign candidates after a rigorous vetting process, then gave Hong the job following a brief meeting between him and a senior KFA executive. The National Assembly summoned Hong and KFA leaders to parliamentary hearings, and the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism launched a formal probe.

Following Saturday's elimination, both the ruling Democratic Party and the main opposition People Power Party called for a parliamentary investigation into the KFA's operations. President Lee Jae Myung weighed in on social media, writing that the exit was the result of "failure with the organisation and personnel decisions" and warning that "when you put an incompetent person in charge by prioritising personal connections over abilities, then it's easy to predict how things will play out." He pledged a broad reform of sports administration and asked the culture ministry to identify the causes of the failure. KFA president Chung Mong-gyu, who is in his fourth term leading the body and has faced separate criticism for attempting to pardon players banned for match-fixing, had already announced before the tournament that he would resign after it concluded.

The fallout has prompted soul-searching among South Korean football figures. Former captain Park Ji-sung, who played for Manchester United, said the country had "forgotten the lessons" learned during its run to the semi-finals as co-host of the 2002 World Cup — a tournament in which a younger Hong Myung-bo captained the side. "It's unfortunate that this kind of cycle keeps repeating," Park said. Hong, who becomes the third coaching casualty of this World Cup after Tunisia's Sabri Lamouchi and Scotland's Steve Clarke, said he would continue to support Korean football from the sidelines. "Even though I am leaving the national team, I am not abandoning Korean football altogether," he said.