Is Daejeon a football city?

Runners-up in both K League 1 and the Korea Baseball Organization, sports fans in the city of Daejeon experienced a year like no other in 2025. Second place in K League 1 marks Daejeon Hana Citizen's best-ever finish, while reaching the KBO Korean Series was Hanwha Eagles' best season since 1999.

Daejeon Metropolitan City is known as, or has in the past been called, the "Special Football City." Daejeon Citizen Football Club was founded in 1997 because of the appetite for football in the city, when K League was centralised and played in neutral venues.

The passionate support of Daejeon Citizen and later Daejeon Hana Citizen, even when the team wasn't going too well, has also helped curate that image of a football city.

But attendance figures in 2025 were low enough, or not as impressive as they could be, to ponder whether Daejeon can still be called the "Special Football City." A prominent supporter remarked to me when asked why there were only 7,097 people there for the Round 21, Friday night fixture with Jeju SK, that "It's no fun, is it?"

Jeju have a small away following, but just over 7,000 for a team second in the league was surprising, and the Islanders' away support of 177 that night wasn't even the smallest to visit Purple Arena this season. Gimcheon's 112 from the previous home match earned that distinction.

Pre-split, Daejeon's average attendance was 10,940 from a total of 175,044. Last season - a relegation battle with safety only secured in Round 37 -  it was 9,853, and in 2023, the club's first season back in the top flight in eight years, it was 13,439.

So, was uninspiring football on offer, or is it because of Daejeon's other major sports team - the Hanwha Eagles had their best season in over 25 years? In August, the Eagles are having their best season in decades, setting a KBO record for the number of single-season sellouts with 48, which then rose until there weren't any more games to sell out.

Looking at the Hanwha Eagles games that clashed with Daejeon Hana Citizen home games, there is a slight pattern of an attendance dip after a defeat if Hanwha were at home. On five occasions during the regular season, Daejeon Hana Citizen played home games on the same day as the city's baseball team. On three occasions, the attendance was down compared to the previous home game. FC Seoul was an exception, but the capital club's large away support has to be taken into consideration.

Looking at the results of the previous home game, Daejeon lost 2-0 to Jeonbuk in Round 7and saw a dip of around 5,000 fans in the following home game, a 1-0 win over Gangwon in Round 10, but Jeonbuk's large away support must also be taken into consideration.

Taking into account only home fans, the visit of Jeonuk attracted 10,476 home fans, while the FC Seoul fixture saw a similar number of home fans (10,977) through the turnstiles.

From the Round 13 0-0 draw at home to FC Seoul, which saw Daejeon fail to register a single shot on target, there was a drop of around 3,000 fans in the next home game, a 2-1 win over Daegu FC in Round 15. But the drop was 1,934 when counting home fans only.

There was an increase of around 4,000 from the 1-1 draw with Jeju SK in Round 21 when FC Seoul visited Purple Arena in Round 24, but again, Seoul's large away support inflates the attendance figure. Seoul brought over 10 times the number of away fans, 1,904, compared to Jeju's 177.

A clearer indicator could be the 2,500 drop from the Round 25 draw with Suwon FC to the Round 28 draw with Gimcheon Sangmu. Both teams brought fewer than 1,000 away fans - Suwon 700, Gimcheon 253).

The final day of the regular season, a 3-1 home win over Jeju SK, coincided with the Eagles' KBO postseason semiplayoff clash with Samsung Lions and saw a drop of over 10,000 compared to the win over Daegu. However, again, there are mitigating circumstances because a very popular singer was a special guest at Daejeon World Cup Stadium. His loyal fan base has been known to boost football stadium attendances in the capital, too.

2025 Home Attendances

R2, Feb. 23rd vs. Ulsan HD - 19,628 (2,886 away fans)R3, Mar. 3rd vs. Suwon FC - 7,220 (472 away fans)R6, Mar. 29th vs. Gwangju FC - 11,469 (899 away fans)R7, Apr. 5th vs. Jeonbuk Hyundai Motors - 14,622 (4,146 away fans)R10, Apr. 27th vs. Gangwon FC - 9,412 (636 away fans)R11, May 3rd vs. FC Anyang - 12,570 (1,357 away fans)R13, May 10th vs. FC Seoul - 13,706 (2,729 away fans)R15 May 24th vs. Daegu FC - 10,417 (1,374 away fans)R16 May 27th vs. Pohang Steelers - 5,833 (424 away fans)R19 Jun. 18th vs. Gimcheon Sangmu - 5,016 (112 away fans)R21 Jun. 27th vs. Jeju SK - 7,097 (177 away fans)R24 Jul. 27th vs. FC Seoul - 11,029 (1,904 away fans)R25 Aug. 10th vs. Suwon FC - 9,022 (700 away fans)R28 Aug. 31st vs. Gimcheon Sangmu - 6,534 (253 away fans)R30 Sept. 20th vs. Daegu FC - 21,045 (2,546 away fans)R33 Oct. 18th vs. Jeju SK - 10,425 (280 away fans)

Total: 175,045 (154,150 home fans)

Bold indicates matches were played on the same day as a Hanwha Eagles match.

Hanwha Eagles played one Korean Series match on the same day as Daejeon Hana Citizen, but was an away game, Oct 26th away to LG Twins in Seoul

Post-split

R34 Oct. 26th vs. Pohang Steelers - 8,275 (1,197 away fans)R35 Nov. 1st vs. FC Seoul - 9,353 (1,736 away fans)R37 Nov. 22nd vs Gangwon FC - 9,102 (493 away fans)

Crunching numbers

Daejeon's average attendance of 10,620 is the fourth-highest this season, behind Seoul, Jeonbuk, and Ulsan. This is an improvement on 2024's 9,853 to rank sixth. In 2023, Daejeon's first season back in the top flight in eight years, the Purples averaged 13,439 to rank fourth, again behind Seoul, Ulsan, and Jeonbuk.

Their average over the last three seasons, then, is 11,304, which would be enough to be the third highest in 2019 (the last season before the COVID-19 pandemic), second in 2018 and 2017, and fourth in 2016 when looking at the top-flight seasons when only paid attendances are counted in the official numbers. The numbers back up that Daejeon is indeed a football city, but it would be worth noting that their main rivals for the attendances crown don't have baseball teams in the cities where they are situated.

Going back to before Daejeon's first relegation in 2013, Citizen had an average of 6,640 to rank 10th out of 14. In 2015, the season of their second relegation, Daejeon ranked 11th out of 12 with 2,740.

Factors affecting attendances

Ticket prices

Perhaps the biggest factor is ticket prices. A match day ticket at Daejeon Hana Citizen in 2025 cost 16,000 won at the cheapest, a price freeze from 2024 and 2023, going up to 24,000 for the premium seats. At Hanwha Eagles' brand new stadium in 2025, tickets started at 7,500 for the 'cheap seats' in the outfield, going up to just 9,000 won, with outerfield assigned seats at 10,500 to 13,000 won. Infield researched seats, which would be considered mid-range, cost 14,000 to 19,500 won. The baseball is cheaper, but there are more games.

Population

Daejeon is the fifth-largest city in Korea, with a population as of 2024 of 1.48 million, which means that their average attendance of 10,620 is 0.72% of the population, enough to rank seventh out of 11 (excluding Gangwon, who play at two different stadiums hundreds of miles apart). Jeonbuk have the highest percentage of the city's population attending matches with 2.78%, followed by Pohang Steelers at 2.04%, Gimcheon in third with 1.93%, Jeju SK with 1.05% (whole island), Ulsan with 1.27%, and FC Anyang at 1.4% in terms of the teams with higher percentages than Daejeon.

To exclude the cities with no baseball teams, Daejeon would be first, ahead of the likes of Daegu FC with 0.44%, Suwon FC with 0.4%, Gwangju with 0.28%, and FC Seoul with 0.24% - all cities that do have baseball teams.

We spoke to three fans of both teams, Daejeon Hana Citizen and Hanwha Eagles, to hear what they thought.

What fans say

Do you actively support both Daejeon Hana Citizen and Hanwha Eagles?

Fan 1: "Both clubs are my teams. I’ve been cheering for them for over 20 years."

Fan 2: “Several years ago, I didn’t pay much attention to Daejeon Hana Citizen and only actively supported the Hanwha Eagles. But about three to four years ago, I started supporting Daejeon Hana Citizen more passionately. In conclusion, I now actively support both teams.”Fan 3: "Yes, that's right."

If they both have home games on the same day (at the same or similar time), which game would you go to?

Fan 1: "I’m way more into football, so if they play at the same time, I always go with football. And baseball has like six games a week, so even if I skip a day, there’s always another game — that’s a big difference too."

Fan 2: “It may depend on the importance of each match, but for now I would go to Daejeon Hana Citizen’s home game. Even if it were an away game, my answer would be the same.”

Fan 3: “I think it would depend on the importance of the match. If Daejeon were playing Jeonbuk, I would naturally go to the Jeonbuk match, and if Hanwha were playing LG, I think I would go to the Hanwha Eagles game.”

Have you ever chosen to go to the baseball because of a poor atmosphere or performance from the football team in recent games?

Fan 1: Football is always my No.1, no matter how the teams are doing, so it’s not about the results for me

Fan 2: “No. Whether I attend a game in person does not change based on the atmosphere. In fact, the worse the atmosphere is, the more I think the team needs support.”

Fan 3: “Yes, embarrassingly, that’s true. I just don’t want to be stressed all the way through the weekend…”

Do you know people who support both but tend to choose baseball over football?

Fan 1: I think it’s normal for a lot of fans to switch teams depending on the results. That’s why we need to build an environment that brings in fans who stick around no matter what.

Fan 2: “My lovely girlfriend is exactly like that right now. She used to be a light SSG Wyverns fan, but because of me, she started supporting Daejeon Hana Citizen, and a bit later, she became a Hanwha Eagles fan. Now she’s even more passionate about baseball than I am.”

Fan 3: "Yep, me."

Is Daejeon a football city?

Fan 1: Sometimes it feels like a football city, but honestly, it feels like a baseball city more often. Hopefully, it becomes a real football city from here on out!

Fan 2: “Not yet. In the past, around 2003, the city even earned the nickname ‘Special Football City’ because football was so popular. But I think the place Daejeon Hana Citizen is aiming for now is so high and great that the glory of the past will look small in comparison. At this point, I would say the city is still in the process of moving toward that goal.”

Fan 3: “Honestly, I don’t think so. It feels more like a baseball city.”

Conclusion

Daejeon is a sports city. It also has professional basketball and volleyball teams, but while there will be debate over which sport is number one, having thriving baseball and football teams is not something many cities in the country can boast of. With Hanwha Eagles enjoying a wonderful first year in their new stadium, and Daejeon Hana Citizen reaching the AFC Champions League Elite, it will be interesting to see how the two can compete with each other or if they can work together with cross-promotions.

Daejeon Hana Citizen has won 'fan-friendly' awards for the work done to enhance the match-day experience, and has launched an AI commentary service for supporters who are visually impaired. There's also talk of an overhaul to the inside of the stadium, replacing old seats, upgrading the lighting and speaker systems for a more European feel.