The incredible story of playing away in Pyongyang: 'A nuclear missile was fired over our hotel'

Lost baggage, memes about Supreme Leader Kim Jong-un and the country's latest missile test were some of the things the Bengaluru squad had to worry about aside from the AFC Cup tie, Asia's version of the Europa League.

Former Australia midfielder Erik Paartalu spoke to BBC Sport about the eye-opening trip. 'The last day of our visit there was a missile getting fired off over our hotel room, you can't exactly prepare for something like that', he said.

'It is one thing going to play somewhere where there may be a war going on, or is an unstable area, but North Korea is a different kettle of fish', Paartalu continued. 'The Australian government had put out a warning urging people not to travel to North Korea, there was no consular or embassy there and there was the threat of a nuclear war'.

'Once we arrived it was business, before we left, we were stepping into unknown. Once we arrived it was a complete eye opener', said the former Melbourne City and Brisbane Roar man. 'Everything you see and hear on the news is different to what you see first hand. It was a bit surreal landing in an almost empty airport'.

'The funny thing was a few North Korea memes had been sent around in the group Whatsapp, poking fun at Kim Jong-un. Before we left we had told everyone to delete the messages, we were all sitting there waiting for someone to get caught', the 31-year-old added. 'I was hoping they didn't have Twitter, I had joked about meeting Kim for a drink'.

Off to North Korea tonight for our @AFCCup match on Wednesday. Hopefully get a beer with Kim when I'm there. Cheers tweeps

— ErikPaartalu (@ErikPaartalu) 10 September 2017

'We had no boots, training kits or balls for the first training session'. Following a confusion with the bags at th airport, many of the bags were lost in transit. 'The boots we bought were cheap quality, some were the wrong size. It was not what you expected from a professional environment. When we got back to the hotel from the first training session, everything was suddenly there'.

'The first time we got to the hotel it was like any other in the world, but there was a TV in the lobby, with a loop of Kim Jong-un. The propaganda starts as soon as you walk in'.

'You get a sense that what you are seeing is a watered down version, what they want you to see. You question that all the time, 'is this real?' There were posters the size of houses everywhere of Kim Jong-un's father and grandfather. Everyone is very patriotic', he added. 'Pyongyang has a population of 2.6 million, you wonder what the other 23 million are doing outside the capital'.

Oh, and we have images! Here's @UdantaK in action against 4.25 SC at the May Day Stadium today. #425vBEN #AFCCup2017 pic.twitter.com/t6H9ATCqgS

— Bengaluru FC (@bengalurufc) 13 September 2017

'There was not much interaction, but if you said hello they said hello back and smiled, that was the big eye-opener, they responded. We had six channels in the hotel, including some Chinese ones, a propaganda channel and Al Jazeera. Lo and behold I watched that North Korea had launched a missile at 6am that morning'.

Bengaluru held a 3-0 lead from the home leg and the match in Pyongyang ended 0-0 to see the Indian side through to the final. Paartalu spoke about the tie which was played in the 150,000-seater May Stadium, in front of a measly crowd of 8-9,000.

'The stadium was humongous, if it had been full it would have been intimidating, but not with 9,000 fans', Paartalu said. 'It did go through my head, "what happens to us if we win?'' The boys were joking that if we score we shouldn't celebrate, or if we are three nil up to cool it, but it finished a respectable 0-0. I guess for the majority of fans in the stadium it was a draw, they may not even have known what happened in the first leg'.

Warriors.#WeAreBFC pic.twitter.com/v4rROIXX2R

— Bengaluru FC (@bengalurufc) 13 September 2017

'As we were checking out a guy told us that if we had stood outside the hotel at 6am we would have seen the missile go over our hotel, it had been fired from the airport and the trajectory was clear for everyone to see'.

'The boys looked at each other, like ''let's get out of here as quickly as possible''. When it got to that point, it hammered home ''let's just get the hell out of here''. He added: 'I am not sure if the North Koreans are fully aware of the situation'.

'North Korea is a beautiful country, blue skies, plants and flowers and greenery and farms. It does not make you feel uneasy at all', Paartalu said.

'The feeling I had was I felt sorry, sorry for the young boys training with a smile on their face, the ball at their feet, loving the game of football. To think this place could get wiped out and these people suffer really does make me feel sorry, I just hope it doesn't happen'.