Koreans Abroad Weekend Preview and Midweek Recap

(image via premierleague.com)

By @KoreaFootAbroad

Last weekend for the Bundesliga but nearing the craziest part of the schedule for PL sides.  A tough loss for Augsburg where none of the breaks went their way, with both Dortmund goals relying on unfortunate bounces.

Day	Time (KST)	Player	Club	Opponent	TV
Saturday	4:30 AM	Kim Jin Su	Hoffenheim	@Schalke	Fox Sports 2
Saturday	11:30 PM	Hong Jeong Ho	Augsburg	@Hamburg	Fox Soccer 2 Go
Saturday	11:30 PM	Ji Dong Won	Augsburg	@Hamburg	Fox Soccer 2 Go
Saturday	11:30 PM	Koo Ja Cheol	Augsburg	@Hamburg	Fox Soccer 2 Go
Saturday	11:30 PM	Park Joo Ho	Dortmund	@Koln	Fox Sports 2
Sunday	12:00 AM	Lee Chung Yong	Crystal Palace	@Stoke City	NBC Extra Time
Sunday	12:00 AM	Yun Suk Young	QPR	@Bristol City	None
Sunday	12:00 AM	Son Heung Min	Tottenham	@Southampton	NBC Extra Time
Monday	1:00 AM	Ki Sung Yueng	Swansea	West Ham	NBCSN
Monday	1:00 AM	Suk Hyun Jun	Vitoria Setubal	@Tondela	None

Kim Jin Su -- He should start coming off one of his stronger performances.

Koo Ja Cheol -- Was one of the strongest players in the first half of the cup match, Koo was everywhere with some nice dribbling and passing.  All his hard work though seemed to take a toll halfway through the second half and he came off with an injury.  It looked a bit precautionary so we'll have to see the extent of the injury.  If he's healthy, he'll start and if not, still might be on the bench if he can contribute at all.

Hong Jeong Ho -- A so-so performance where much of the battle was in the middle third.  He should have closed down tighter on the second goal, but the shooter was in a manageable space and the goal came off a deflection.  He started off a bit rough with some questionable decision making but calmed down as the match wore on.  He'll have to start with options few for Weinzierl.

Ji Dong Won -- All the bad luck that fell upon Augsburg fell even harder on Ji, with many crosses and shots blocked and his deflected clearance falling to Aubameyang who scored the first goal.  And in the final minutes, he had a chance to at least grab a consolation goal but was saved.  He had more than a few positive moments too, including a great throughball that Bobadilla himself should have scored.  I expect him to be on the bench.

Park Joo Ho -- He was an unused sub and he'll have to look to winter training to get in better sync with his Dortmund teammates and perhaps re-earn the trust of Tuchel.  I think he'll miss out on the match or be an unused sub.

Lee Chung Yong -- Haven't checked on the health of the Crystal Palace players but he'll be fortunate to make the bench.  He'll have to wait for opportunities in the packed holiday fixture list.

Yun Suk Young -- I don't see any change for him as he again was left off the squad.  At this point, he'll probably hope for health ahead of him so that he can be free to hook on with a new club in the January window.  FA rules make it very unlikely to find another UK club so he'll have to look to continental Europe if he wants a chance to continue his European career.  But the Championship isn't well thought of and is hard to scout with limited TV, so he'll have to hope that some buyer was intrigued by some of his PL performances last season and will want to take a low-risk chance with him.

Son Heung Min -- Perhaps we see Son start a PL match.  His performance last week wasn't good but they could have used some of his positive attributes in a flat team showing.  Hopefully he's been working on his shooting which has been pretty horrendous, especially given his historical capabilities in that area.

Ki Sung Yueng -- Another weekend with interim manager and as such, I expect something similar to last week where things looked better for Swansea in the diamond and Ki starting on one side of that.  Perhaps Shelvey is fit enough to be on the other side of the diamond and will draw enough attention so that Ki will have more opportunities.

Suk Hyun Jun -- Scored a beautiful highlight goal midweek in a cup loss and he should start again this weekend and keep adding to his growing goal total.