As Leeds prepare to face Manchester United this weekend, the BBC investigates how Alan Smith’s move from Elland Road to Old Trafford sparked a linguistic phenomenon 5,000 miles away in South Korea.
In the summer of 2004, Leeds United’s Alan Smith did the unthinkable and moved to the club’s arch-rivals, Manchester United.
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But in the three years since his £7m move to Old Trafford, where the homegrown striker has been a local hero, Smith has never reached the heights of his previous club.
More than 5,000 miles away in South Korea, Smith’s poor form gave rise to an initially obscure phrase that actually meant one’s peak or the pinnacle of one’s life.
“Leeds Day” is now an everyday phrase among the country’s 52 million people, even though most people there seem to have never heard of the city, let alone the players.
“Most people out there don’t know the etymology of it, so I explain it myself,” said Josh Wellman, contact person for Leeds United’s Korean supporters group.
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Mr Wireman, from Hemsworth, West Yorkshire, moved to South Korea in 2017 and spent much of the next eight years working there as an English teacher before returning home last month.
He said Smith’s move across the Pennines when he was 12 was his first “heartbreak” in football.
“I guess when I first heard the phrase, it wasn’t nice to be reminded of that,” Mr. Wireman said with a laugh.
“It was my first year there. I had never heard of it before I went.
“The first person I worked with was from Barnsley and he really loved his football so he was the one to explain that to me.”
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“Leeds Day” is believed to have first appeared on Korean online forums in the 2000s, when Park Ji Sung, one of the country’s best players, joined United a year after Smith.
South Korean Park Ji-sung, nicknamed “Three Lungs” for his fitness levels, played alongside Smith at Manchester United [Richard Heathcote/Getty Images]
With the spread of the Internet and people’s growing interest in English football in South Korea, the conditions are ripe for this sentence to spread.
“At first it was only used by fans, but then it was used more and more widely by others,” said Dr Ciue Xu, a lecturer in Korean at the University of Leeds.
She added that the meaning of Leeds Day had “evolved” over time.
“When it first started, it actually meant ‘past times,’ but now it’s used more to refer to someone’s youth or prime.
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“It can also refer to your popularity as a superstar or singer, your popularity among audiences, or your wealth.”
Josh Wellman (left) hosts a podcast for people who immigrated to South Korea with expat Tony Martin [Josh Wileman]
Recently, Dr. Xu said, the younger generation has abandoned the “day” part of the phrase and now just uses “Leeds.”
However, a new Korean restaurant opened in Leeds city center in April by Hyung Joon Kim and his wife Yun Seung Pang uses the phrase in its entirety.
“To be honest, I didn’t know the origin at first,” admits Joon, 54, who first moved to the UK from South Korea in 2001. “Then as I was researching it, I had a lightbulb moment.”
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“About 15 or 20 years ago I started seeing celebrities posting photos of themselves on social media from their younger years or ‘Leeds days’,” he explains.
“It’s a word that Koreans know, but foreigners don’t really know.
“So we use it because we want people to know we serve authentic Korean food.”
Mr. Wireman, who co-hosts a podcast about Korean culture for people who have immigrated to South Korea, said one of his own students was even named Liz.
He also encountered a dermatology clinic and a pub named after the city, which hosted a dozen Leeds United fans for a promotional party a few years ago.
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However, Mr Wellman said far from being a bustling sports bar with a big TV, it was actually “a pretty posh little expensive whiskey bar, which is not the best place for a dozen people to watch a football match”.
“I don’t think the owners are too happy,” he added.
Alan Smith, who spent the final weeks of his Manchester United career playing in South Korea, took part in a pre-season friendly [Getty Images]
While the phrase initially made the 33-year-old (who is 35 in South Korea due to cultural differences in how age is calculated) uncomfortable due to Smith’s much-maligned behavior, he quickly grew to like it as a reminder of home.
“If I see it in a restaurant, I’ll take a picture and send it to everyone – ‘Look at this, we’re famous’,” he explains.
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“Any connection I can find between Korea and Leeds is great, even if most people there don’t know what it means.”
Listen to highlights West Yorkshire on BBC Soundscatch up on the latest “Look North” TV Series.
