Blue Kid on the Block

Jen O’Neill interviews the Manchester City forward who joined at 16 in October 2017 and announced herself with a match-winning assist off the bench in the 2020 FA Cup final, still her top moment. Park describes training twice a day, and the extra stretching, mobility and home gym work she did from about ten or eleven that nobody saw, including a Christmas morning run up a hill she has never found easier. She learned freestyle tricks from YouTube videos. Told that York’s regional talent club called her a once-in-a-generation player, she treats expectation as white noise and says the only pressure comes from herself. She studies Janine Beckie’s crossing and Hayley Raso’s push-and-double-step, names Alex Greenwood and Lauren Hemp as her closest friends, and would rescue her hoodies from a fire.