Player profile

South Korea’s best striker, he travels to his second World Cup with a slight question mark over his fitness after his season was ended by a thigh problem picked up in Monaco’s French Cup final loss to PSG on 1 May.

He did feature in warm-up games against Japan and Belarus later that month, but did not complete 90 minutes on either occasion.

He has been a regular starter since joining Monaco in 2008, although he has not been a prolific scorer, failing to reach double figures in either of his two seasons with the club. His goalscoring form fell away this season - his last club goals were in January, when he netted twice against Nice.

His main attributes are his pace, link-up play and work-rate. Expect plenty of intelligent runs as well - he reportedly has an IQ of 150, placing him in the top 0.1% of the world’s population.

He burst on the scene in 2004, when he was named Asian Young Player of the Year. Given his international debut in 2005, he scored on his first two appearances, the second of which was a win against Kuwait that sealed qualification for the 2006 World Cup. However, a dip in form with Seoul meant he was left on the bench for Korea’s first two games in Germany.

He was booked in the crunch game against Switzerland, with Philippe Senderos heading in from the resulting free-kick. Park was also part of the squad at the 2008 Olympics, scoring against Cameroon with a free-kick.

No Korean played in more of the qualifiers for the 2010 World Cup, and three of his four goals came away from home. He is a devout Christian, and has a road named after him in his country.