Season Review, Part 21: Yoon Seok-ju, the Midfielder Who Came Back With the Back Four

Part 20 covered Seo Jin-seok, the midfielder who held the job in the spring. Part 21 is the one who took it in July and has not given it back. Yoon Seok-ju missed the first half of the season entirely, and Seoul have lost once in the eleven league matches he has played.

The season in one paragraph

Yoon Seok-ju arrived from Pohang in January 2025 with a résumé that read well on paper: a starter at the 2019 U-17 World Cup, a K League 2 title with Gimcheon Sangmu during his military service, and a scouting line about his kicking range and his ability to cut out attacks. He said then that his goal was “promotion, no matter what,” and that he wanted to be a player who put energy into the team. His first year at Mokdong brought eight appearances and 454 minutes. In December, Sports Chosun reported that he had undergone surgery, part of a piece on how thin the midfield was. He did not make a matchday squad from February to June. Then, before the first match after the World Cup break, Kim Do-gyun announced a back four and said Yoon had trained well with the first-choice players while the new shape was being drilled. He started at Gimhae and has played in every match since: 11 appearances, nine starts, 894 minutes, one assist, two yellow cards. Seoul’s record in those eleven matches is six wins, four draws and one defeat.

By the numbers

	2025	2026 through Round 27
Appearances, starts	8	11, 9
Minutes	454	894
Goals	0	0
Assists	0	1
Yellow cards	0	2
Passes completed, accuracy		400, 89 percent
Accurate long balls		25, at 57 percent
Chances created, big chances created		13, 1
Shots, on target		11, 2
Tackles, interceptions, blocks		11, 12, 8
Recoveries		40
Duels won		46 percent
Average FotMob rating		7.24
Seoul’s record with him on the pitch		W6 D4 L1

Passing, defensive and rating figures are FotMob’s. FotMob named him player of the match at Seongnam in Round 24.

What he has done well

He made the new shape work from the first night. The 4-2-3-1 at Gimhae on July 5 needed a second holder beside Park Chang-hwan, and Yoon was it. The broadcast picked out his diagonal runs into the half spaces in the opening minutes, the patterns the staff had drilled during the break, and he lasted 82 minutes in his first competitive match of the year. Kim Do-gyun has changed the shape since, back to a back three at Suwon FC, a 4-3-3 with Carius and Park Chang-hwan against Cheonan and Cheongju, a 3-4-3 again against Daegu. Yoon has been in the middle of all of them.

The team stopped losing. From Gimhae to Cheongju, Seoul went nine league matches without a defeat, and Yoon played in all nine. The run included the win at Busan, where SPOTV described him and Park Chang-hwan “coordinating attack and defense” from the base of midfield, and the goalless draw at Hwaseong, where he held the middle beside Cho Jun-hyun with Park Chang-hwan left out.

He passes forward, and long. Eighty-nine percent passing is the number of a safe holder, but 25 accurate long balls in 894 minutes is not. The best of them came at Seongnam on August 29, in a rotated side that had been behind since the hour. On 83 minutes he hung a long cross in from deep, Gabriel rose above the defender who had just come on, and the header went in at the far corner. It was his only assist of the season and Seoul’s only goal of the night, and FotMob rated him the best player on the pitch.

He shoots from distance. Early at Suwon FC in July he hit the junction of post and crossbar from outside the box. Against Cheonan six days later he half-volleyed one just past the frame. At Seongnam a shot on 75 went out off a defender. Against Daegu he tried one from the edge of the box in first-half stoppage time. None has gone in, but a holding midfielder who makes opponents close him down 25 meters out opens space for everyone else.

He defends with his body. Eleven minutes into the Suwon Samsung match, with the league leaders breaking, Kang Sung-jin exchanged passes with Kang Hyun-muk and was through one-on-one. OSEN described what happened next: he was stopped by Yoon’s “diving tackle.” Twelve interceptions and eight blocked shots in eleven matches say that was not a one-off.

Where the same mistakes keep showing up

No goal. Eleven shots, two on target. For a player whose long shots are now a feature of the side, that is too few on target. The woodwork at Suwon FC is the closest he has come, and a midfield that also relies on Carius and Park Chang-hwan for goals would be much harder to defend if its holder scored once.

Legs. He cramped late at Suwon FC in July and came off on 79 minutes, thirteen days after coming off on 82 at Gimhae. He has finished six matches since, so the fitness has come. But he had not played a competitive match for nine months before July, and the run-in will test it.

Duels and fouls. He wins fewer than half his duels, and 13 fouls with two bookings in eleven matches is a holder’s price, but a price all the same. In the one defeat, 1-0 at home to Suwon Samsung, he was the first midfielder Kim took off, on 59 minutes, for center-back Kim Oh-kyu in the reshuffle to chase the game.

His strengths, and what they mean for the last six

He is the balance in the middle. Kim has used him beside Park Chang-hwan, beside Cho Jun-hyun, and in a three with Carius. With Park Chang-hwan already missing the Daegu match, Yoon is the one midfielder whose place does not move, and the last six will be played around him.

Long passes against low blocks. Gimpo, Yongin and Gyeongnam away, and Gimhae, Jeonnam and Chungnam Asan at Mokdong, include several sides that will sit in. Seongnam showed what his delivery from deep can do when Seoul put a target in the box. It is a route Kim reached for late at Tancheon. It could come earlier.

Cover for the counter. Seoul have conceded from transitions and second balls all season. A holder who reads the pass, as he did against Kang Sung-jin, is worth as much in the last six as any goal from midfield.

The verdict at Round 27

Yoon Seok-ju has done what was asked of him in a system that did not exist before July. He came back from surgery into a new system, started nine of eleven matches, passed at 89 percent, created a goal that saved a point, and has been on the pitch for a nine-match unbeaten run. What keeps the grade in the B range is the other half: no goal, few shots on target, and a body that had to find its fitness in the middle of a promotion race.

Grade so far: B minus. Half a season, but the half in which Seoul climbed to second and stayed in the promotion race, and he has been an ever-present in it.

Match log

Round	Opponent	Result	Role or Minutes	Goals	Assists	Note
16	Gimhae (A)	W 3-1	Start, 82			First match of the season, back four debuts
18	Suwon FC (A)	D 2-2	Start, 79			Long shot off the junction of post and bar, cramped late
19	Cheonan (H)	W 4-3	Start, 90			Half-volley from distance just wide
20	Busan (A)	W 2-1	Start, 90			Double pivot with Park Chang-hwan, booked
21	Hwaseong (A)	D 0-0	Start, 90			Beside Cho Jun-hyun
22	Ansan (H)	W 3-1	Sub, 84			On for Euller after his hat trick
23	Paju (H)	D 1-1	Sub, 79			On for Kim Oh-kyu
24	Seongnam (A)	D 1-1	Start, 90		1	Cross for Gabriel’s equalizer, FotMob player of the match
25	Chungbuk Cheongju (A)	W 2-0	Start, 90			Booked on 87
26	Suwon Samsung (H)	L 0-1	Start, 59			Diving tackle on Kang Sung-jin, replaced by Kim Oh-kyu
27	Daegu (H)	W 2-1	Start, 90			Inside in a 3-4-3 with Cho Jun-hyun

Statistics from the K League record and the club site, with match detail from the season’s digests and Korean match reports. Part 22 follows.