Aston Villa v Manchester United Goalscorer Preview: Park Ji-Sung

Manchester United’s South Korean star Park Ji-Sung is a strong candidate to score a goal during the club’s Premier League clash with Aston Villa at Villa Park.

Park’s brace against Wolverhampton Wanderers are the only Premier League goals the winger has scored this season. However, the importance of these goals is likely to have played a huge role in the player’s confidence.

With Sir Alex Ferguson likely to deploy a 4-5-1 formation against Aston Villa, with Dimitar Berbatov favourite to start up front, Park will be asked to play a vital role in the team from the left or right flank.

What makes him so difficult to play and defend against is his versatility. The South Korean can switch between a defensive and attacking mentality in no time at all, which means it’s hard for defenders to keep him quiet for an entire 90 minute period.

Park often gets overlooked as a possible goalscorer in the Manchester United team because Ferguson frequently asks him to play more disciplined roles. However, he is effective when cutting in from the wings to shoot at goal. He has already scored more goals in total this season (six) then he did throughout all of last season (five).

His small size and pace mean he can ghost into the area either in front of or behind the opposition defence. His ball control is superb and his winner against Wolves in the Premier League match at Old Trafford shows he has enough intelligence and skill to control the ball in a confined area.

Park is a best price of 13/1 to score first and also looks good value at 9/2 to score at any point in the game with Aston Villa. Villa play very wide as a team, which will leave a lot of space for Park to run into and exploit. He’s at his very best when he has space to sprint into and a defence, which is disorganised.

Not a lot of people will give Park a second thought as a possible goalscorer for this match. However, he embodies everything that is good about the Manchester United work ethic. The team will be going for a win and Park plays in a prominent area of the United attack.