Is Hong Myung-bo (35, LA Galaxy), an Eternal Libero, More Popular than Handsome Soccer Star David Beckham (29, Real Madrid)?

Hong Myung-bo and David Beckham were chosen together by Pele, the soccer emperor, as two of the 100 greatest living players (The FIFA 100) for the 100th anniversary of FIFA. On the site, “The FIFA 100” (www.the-100.com), you can view the photographs of the soccer players and their profiles. But it is remarkable that Hong Myung-bo’s photograph costs 6,530 euros (about 9.14 million won) while Beckham’s costs only 5,030 euros (about 7.04 million won).

This price was fixed by the photographers. The photograph of Hong Myung-bo, who is standing with two children looking at him at a playground, costs 2.1 million won more than that of Beckham’s.

Meanwhile, among the 100 stars, there were 15 Brazilians, the most on the list. It proves that Brazil is the most powerful country in world soccer. Following Brazil, France and Italy jointly took the second spot.

Originally, 100 world top stars were expected to be chosen by Pele, but the final list, released on March 5, showed 125 players. This was because Pele appealed that it was too difficult to choose 100 stars among the 300 candidates.

The list of the 100 world top stars includes Pele, Rivaldo, and Carlos Alberto, Pele’s teammate in Brazil; Michel Platini, Zinedine Zidane, and Thierry Henry of France; Roberto Baggio and Paolo Maldini of Italy.

Thirteen soccer players, including Johann Fruyff and Ruud van Nistelrooy, were chosen from the Netherlands. Ten players were chosen from Argentina (including Diego Armando Maradona and Gabriel Omar Bautista) and Germany respectively (including Franz Beckenbauer and Lothar Matthaeus), while 21 countries, including South Korea (Hong Myung-bo) and Japan (Hidetoshi Nakata), produced one star player.

Soon-Il Kwon stt77@donga.com