SCOTLAND coach Anna Signeul says she is happy to be playing North Korea in next year’s Cyprus Cup despite the Asian side having been involved in one of football’s biggest doping scandals.
The game, which is scheduled for March, will also be North Korea’s first contact with Scotland since the 2012 London Olympics fiasco at Hampden Park. Then, the North Korean team walked off the pitch in protest at their players’ images being shown on a screen beside the South Korean flag.
They went on to win the game, against Colombia, 2-0.
Although allowed to play at the Olympics, the North Koreans were then banned by Fifa from taking part in the 2014 Asian Cup and last year’s World Cup in Canada. It followed five of their players testing positive for steroids at the 2011 World Cup in Germany.
The North Korean defence was that the players had used traditional musk deer gland medicine after being struck by lightning at a training camp. This was rejected and on top of the tournament eliminations the five players were suspended for periods of 14-18 months, while the team doctor is still serving a six-year ban.
Despite these tournament bans affecting their Fifa ranking, the North Koreans remain the ninth best side in international women’s football.
“As with all punishments they have served their sentence,” Signeul said following yesterday’s draw which put the Scots in Group B. The other two teams are Austria and New Zealand.
Scotland have never played either North Korea or Austria before but were beaten 1-0 by New Zealand the last time the nations met, also in the Cyprus Cup, three years ago.
“It’s three teams with different styles of play so it’s a good group for us,” Signeul said.
With South Korea also in the 12-team tournament, there is the potential for the two bitter Asian rivals to meet each other after the group stage.
Scotland, who have been regulars at the annual tournament, will be returning to Cyprus after missing out this year when former performance director Brian McClair chose to play a home friendly against Spain instead.
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