Forget Soccer, We're All Watching Cho Gue-sung

Cho Gue-sung, a 2022 FIFA World Cup player for South Korea, is dealing with the repercussions of being really, really, ridiculously good-looking. Throughout the tournament, the 24-year-old has gained international recognition, and his follower count has surged in turn. Per The Athletic, at the beginning of the World Cup, Cho had 20,000 followers on Instagram. As of this writing, he has 1.8 million. It’s not just that fans are following along for Cho’s journey — which has included two headed goals, by the way. They’re also flooding his DMs (as one does when they find a scary-talented athlete with cheekbones that could cut glass).

Cho plays forward for the South Korean team. On Nov. 28, he scored two goals in a span of three minutes during South Korea’s match against Ghana. However, his now-viral popularity might have more to do with, you know, looking like that. According to Reuters journalist Hyunsu Yim, Cho’s fancam already had over six million views by Nov. 28.

South Korean journalist Seo Jung-hwan told The Athletic that Cho actually had to turn off his phone to take a break from the inundation of marriage proposals. “He had to get some rest,” Seo said. “His phone was going all night. It was keeping him awake. He was trying to concentrate on football and, all the time, the messages were coming.” (It’s worth noting that Cho is 6’2”.)

But the internet didn’t keep the love for Cho confined to the DMs. Fans took to Twitter and TikTok to gush over their newfound crush — and they seem to have reached a consensus: They’d watch Cho Gue-sung kick (and head-butt) soccer balls all day long. Here are the thirstiest tweets so far:

Twitter was — predictably — ready to risk it all for Cho, but perhaps the most thirsting happened on TikTok. At the time of publication, the hashtag #choguesung has 226.7 million views. As one fan put it, “One week ago no one knew this man and now he’s my husband and we have 3 kids.”

Well, it looks like at least 1.8 million Cho fans will be tuning into South Korea’s next World Cup match versus Brazil on Dec. 5.