Gyeongnam FC

The Nakdonggang derby takes its name from the river. There is a second fixture, the Seomjingang derby against Jeonnam Dragons, though it has never carried the same weight.

The club came into being on 17 January 2006, set up and run by the government of South Gyeongsang Province, and it started at the top: admitted straight into the K League as its fourteenth club, with no years in the amateur game behind it. In its first season it finished third in the Hauzen Cup.

Cho Kwang-rae took them to the Korean FA Cup final in 2008, where Pohang Steelers beat them, and the spell left a nickname behind — Cho Kwang-rae's kindergarten, for the young players he put on the pitch. The other nickname, The Roses, is the one on the badge. A second final came in 2012 and ended the same way, against Seongnam Ilhwa Chunma.

The best of it arrived in 2018. Gyeongnam finished second in K League 1, a season after winning the second division at the first attempt following relegation in 2014, and the place carried them into the AFC Champions League group stage the following year.

Since 2010 they have played at the Changwon Football Center, a purpose-built football ground of 15,071 seats. Before that the home was Changwon Civil Stadium, and before that there was nothing at all — no club, only a province that decided in the winter of 2006 to make one.