The WK League returned from a long international break this weekend with a full house of away team wins. Suwon FC surprised nobody by cementing their position at the top of the table with three games to spare, sealing Hwacheon KSPO in second place by extension. The real jeopardy and intrigue in this year’s WK League can be found in the mid-table, where four teams are vying for third place.
To the uninitiated, third place in a league of only eight teams may not seem particularly prestigious, but in the WK League, third signifies oppportunity. At the end of the 28-round league season, the teams in second and third go head-to-head in a one-legged playoff, with the winner going on to face the league champions in a two-legged championship final. Only then are the WK League champions crowned, meaning a team that finishes third in the league could go on to win the title.
In 17 years of WK League, a third-placed team has never managed this feat. In fact, the regular league champions have also gone on to lift the trophy all but twice — in 2010 and 2024. In 2010, second-placed Suwon FMC came back from behind in the championship final to deny Incheon Hyundai Steel Red Angels what could have been their first title. Suwon FMC merged with Suwon FC in 2022, becoming Suwon FC Women. Despite the major change, the club gave a nod to its own history in 2024, finishing second in the league but winning the playoff and defeating would-be first-time champions Hwacheon KSPO in the final.
Not everyone likes this system — there are those who believe the regular league champions should lift the WK League trophy, league table purists who would do away with the playoff and championship final altogether. However, in a small league that has often seen a huge performance gap between the ‘haves’ (teams with corporate backing and competent management) and the ‘have nots’ (teams with extremely limited resources and no full-time support staff), where only one team qualifies for continental footbal and there is no relegation, the current system makes for a less certain — and more exciting — end to the season.
One day the WK League may be big and competitive enough that the championship playoff system becomes obsolete, but for the time being, it serves a purpose. With only three rounds left to play in this year’s league, Suwon FC have secured their position at the top; they will play in the championship final, and host the second leg of that fixture. Second-placed Hwacheon KSPO are also safely out of reach of the rest of the field and will host the playoff.
However, there is still a lot at stake in the closing weeks of the 2026 WK League. Whether you’re a keen fan watching nervously as your team hopes to secure that crucial playoff berth, or a casual viewer looking for stories that go beyond the pitch, there’s plenty of intrigue as Round 26 approaches.
Here are five things that could still happen this season. They probably won’t.
But they could.
That mere possibility is the thrill of the WK League run-in.
1. Suwon FC win absolutely nothing
After lifting the trophy in 2024, Suwon FC had a post-title slump last year, finishing in seventh place. Ahead of the 2026 season, the club brought in the big guns: the legendary Ji Soyun, back at the club for a second time, as well as national team veterans Kim Hyeri and Choe Yuri, and a goal machine: Haruhi Suzuki, who joined the club from Incheon Hyundai Steel Red Angels.
Suwon have dominated this year’s WK League, going top of the table after Round 8 and staying there for the rest of the season, building a comfortable buffer between themselves and Hwacheon KSPO, and scoring more goals than any other club by a significant margin. Suwon’s disappointing defeat at the hands of North Korean club Naegohyang WFC in the semifinals of the AFC Women’s Champions League only seemed to add fuel to their league campaign.
Beyond their league success, Suwon are through to the semi-finals of the inaugural W Korea Cup, and will compete in this month’s National Sports Festival. And yet, due to the aforementioned championship playoff system, Suwon could still finish the season emptyhanded. If Hwacheon KSPO win the playoff and proceed to the championship final, they have a chance to exact revenge on the side that beat them to the trophy after they won the league two years ago. It’s an uneasy possibility for Suwon FC and their fans, but a delicious narrative for the neutral.
2. Incheon Hyundai Steel Red Angels finish dead last
For several years, Incheon Hyundai Steel Red Angels was a name associated not only with verbosity, but with victory. Established in 1993, Hyundai Steel has the longest history of any club in the league, and the most titles, having lifted the trophy in eleven consecutive seasons from 2013 to 2023. Now, however, the Red Angels’ glory years feel like a distant memory. ‘Red Angels fallen from grace’ is a plotline that’s hard to resist — unless, of course, you happen to be an Incheon fan.
After finishing in fourth in 2024, Incheon Hyundai brought in new manager Hur Jeongjae to oversee the club’s revival. He led them as far as the playoff last year, but they were unable to beat Seoul City to secure a place in the final. Incheon’s squad underwent significant change ahead of the 2026 season, with club veterans moved on in favour of a “new generation” of Red Angels. It hasn’t worked. By the end of August, Hur was out, with head coach Kim Eunjeong appointed interim manager just before the international break.
Incheon are currently in seventh, and haven’t won a league game since 20th June. Regardless of results to come, this will be Incheon’s worst season in the WK League era, in terms of both position and points total. There is an 8-point gap between them and Gangjin Swans in eighth, but it is still mathematically possible for the most decorated team in the division to drop to dead last. The oldest and newest teams in the league go head-to-head in an unlikely bottom-of-the-table six-pointer in Round 27 — get your flying (and flapping) metaphors ready for Swans vs. Angels.
3. Seoul City win a domestic treble
Seoul City Amazones became everyone’s favourite underdogs in 2025, winning hearts with plucky performances, quirky goal celebrations, and an irresistible air of camaraderie and joy as they showed that the top half of the table isn’t just for ‘big clubs’. Just when it seemed that Yoo Youngsil’s squad might have reached their limitations, they would pull off another upset, beating the odds to reach the championship final against Hwacheon KSPO. In the first leg of that final, Seoul were three goals behind at half time but clawed two back in the second half. In the second leg, Hwacheon were 4-0 up at 88′, seemingly cruising towards the title, when City went on a thrilling goal spree, scoring three in the dying minutes of the game, giving their fans something to believe in even at the eleventh hour.
Seoul have modest resources, with club policies preventing them from bringing in foreign players. They have the smallest squad in the league, with several players unavailable due to injury. The club has only two goalkeepers, one of whom has spent much of the season recovering from an injury sustained while training in an outfield position; at one point in the summer both were unavailable, and it fell to South Korea international Kim Minji to don the gloves (the midfielder can now boast a a 100% clean sheet record in her professional goalkeeping career).
Despite all of this Seoul City are, somewhat bizarrely, the only club besides Suwon FC to still have a chance of achieving a domestic treble this season. At the time of writing, Seoul are in fifth place in the league, just two points behind third-placed Mungyeong Sangmu, putting them in contention for the playoff. The Amazones are set to face Suwon in the semifinals of the W Korea Cup this weekend, and they will also represent Seoul at the National Sports Festival later this month. The Amazones now have, in internet parlance, the opportunity to do the funniest thing.
4. The four teams vying for third all finish with the same points total
First and second place have already been decided but there are still four teams in contention for third place and that all-important playoff berth. Mungyeong Sangmu, Gyeongju KHNP, Seoul City and Sejong Sportstoto are separated by just five points after Round 25. For those who are keeping track, yes, that does mean that six out of eight WK League sides could still technically win the title.
The race for third is about as tight as it could be, and just one round of fixtures can dramatically alter the table. Every game is crucial for the teams involved in this battle, which could come down to the final day of the season. There is a possible (albeit unlikely) scenario in which all four sides in contention have 37 points on the board when the regular season comes to an end on Saturday, 31st October. Whether it is between all four contenders or just two of them, in the case of a tie, goal difference is the first tie-breaker applied. Gyeongju KHNP are the only club in this pack with a positive goal difference as things stand, so expect to see teams chasing attacking opportunities in an attempt to close the gap.
5. Mungyeong Sangmu qualify for the playoff for the first time ever
Admittedly, this one isn’t very far-fetched, especially after Sangmu’s 1-0 win against Gyeongju on Saturday, which saw them overtake their local rivals to climb to third place. Veteran Kwon Hahnul’s second-half penalty could prove to be a pivotal moment for Sangmu as the club makes a bid for its first ever WK League playoff.
The military side has been a member of the WK League since the league’s inception in 2009 and was previously based in Busan and Boeun before moving to Mungyeong in 2023. Sangmu’s previous best league finish was in 2011, when they came in fourth. Since then, they have never finished the season in the top half of the table, although their trophy cabinet is not completely empty — they won the World Military Women’s Football Championship in 2023, having previously finished as runners-up several times.
Similarly to Seoul City, Mungyeong Sangmu has a smaller squad than most other clubs in the league, and as a military team, their recruitment options are limited. Qualifying for the playoff ahead of clubs with corporate sponsors, whose players are not required to join the army, would be a huge achievement for Mungyeong Sangmu. It would also be another feather in the cap of captain Kwon Hahnul, a one-club-woman who has played for the club for seventeen years. Ahead of Round 26, Mungyeong have the lead in the playoff race, with arguably an easier run of fixtures ahead of them than nearest rivals Gyeongju.
Those who believe that the winners of the regular league should lift the WK League trophy are entitled to their opinion, but even they surely cannot deny that the championship system means there are fewer dead rubbers in the closing weeks of the competition. In reality, none of the above possibilities may come to fruition. Some of them might. Certainly they cannot all happen concurrently, but with so many storylines at play, there will be no shortage of entertainment as the 2026 WK League reaches its climax.
For more on the WK League, visit WK League News, a site dedicated to news and updates from across the women’s game in South Korea
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