Manchester United's Park Ji-sung may be the highest-profile player in the English Premier League, but forward Ji Dong-won will soon be making his mark as the youngest Korean to ever play in the world's most prestigious soccer league. Ji, who is one month past his 20th birthday, is heading to northeast England after Chunnam Dragons FC agreed terms with the EPL club this week. "We decided to agree to Ji's trade to Sunderland for the greater cause," an unidentified official from Chunnam said on Thursday. "Ji's salary is expected to be W900 million and the signing fee is W1 to 1.4 billion." Ji will replace Lee Chung-yong, who joined Bolton in 2009 at the age of 21, as the youngest Korean in the English league. Ji will also be the eighth Korean to play in England's top-flight, following Park, the first Korean to do so when he joined United in 2005, Lee Young-pyo, Seol Ki-hyeon, Lee Dong-gook, Kim Do-heon, Cho Won-hee and Lee Chung-yong. Ji's signing fee appears to be something of a bargain for Sunderland, as Bolton paid FC Seoul W3.6 billion for Lee Chung-yong, and Celtics W3.2 billion for Ki Sung-yueng. The low price is the result of a buy-out clause embedded in Ji's contract with Chunnam. The buy-out clause allows a club to acquire a player it is interested in without the consent of the player's original club if it pays a signing fee that exceeds the amount specified in the player's contract. For Ji, the amount is reported to be as low as W800 million. Chunnam apparently underestimated Ji's chances of moving overseas when it extended his contract at the end of last season to February 2013, mainly because, at the time, he had not worn the national colors. However, the situation changed dramatically when Ji played a pivotal role in the national team's campaign during the Asian Cup in Qatar early this year. English teams including Sunderland and Bolton subsequently tried to lure Ji through local agents. Chunnam resisted the move because it had nurtured Ji from its youth team, but there is nothing it can do to keep Ji. From Sunderland's point of view, the final signing fee was still more than 1.5 times higher than the amount required by the buy-out clause. Sunderland has a long history in English soccer. The northeastern club was established in 1879 and racked up six titles in the early days of the First Division (later replaced by the Premier League) in 1892, 1893, 1895, 1902, 1913, and 1936. In the 2010-11 season, it finished 10th with 12 wins, 11 draws and 15 losses. Asamoah Gyan, a Ghanaian striker who played in a friendly against Korea on Tuesday, was the team's highest-scoring player with 10 goals. However the team has been struggling with a lack of goal-scoring forwards recently, which spells good news for Ji. Sulley Muntari, Gyan's national and club teammate, said before the friendly on Tuesday that Ji has the potential to do better than Gyan if he knuckles down and earns his stripes. Ji will have his farewell match in the K-League on June 26 against Gangwon FC. Prior to that, he will face Jordan in the Olympic regional preliminaries on June 19 and 23.
Well its good to see we are signing someone but I dont have a clue, and I suggest neither do Sunderland, how well the lad will do, lets hope he thrives.
Well all we have to go on at the moment is the You Tube video of him, in which he looked a good player to me. Two footed, quick and good in the air. We had the same issue with Sess, so if he turns out to be as good a signing as Sess was, I for one, will be a very happy man.
Commachio, I remember from a thread about ES and his S Korean banking investment that 1 mill Won = £550 approx Can't be arsed to the sums before breakfast. Thinking about it Won is equivalent of Pound £ Dong sounds like Long So maybe Bill was right after all. Brucey IS shopping at Poundstretchers
