De Ketelaere's exclusive interview with DAZN. Translated with DeepL.
De Ketelaere to DAZN: "Here for the project. I spoke with Pioli, he wants me as a trequartista"
Milan's new signing Charles De Ketelaere was interviewed exclusively by DAZN. These are all his statements:
On the negotiation: "It took a while to get here and that's why the tension was building, but now I'm happy to be here. Only the moment I signed the contract and had the jersey in my hands did I say to myself, "Okay, now I'm an AC Milan player!" and I felt really happy."
On the Milan project: "It wasn't the words that convinced me but what this club is doing. It is going back to the top again, we all see it how much the young people improve here, and as they grow they make the whole team grow. They won the Scudetto, so it's a great team to mature in if you're a young person."
Who impressed you the most in the first few practices? "Clearly the level of everyone is higher than at Bruges: for example, the technical quality of Leao, the finalization of Giroud... All these things. I hope to get to this level as quickly as possible."
Who was your first opponent? "I played against Kjaer, in 11 vs 11 I was facing him."
Pioli reported that Origi described you as "half Kaká and half Havertz." What did you think? "Maybe he compared me to Kaká because he played in Milan, or because of the position on the field. As for Havertz I think we are not similar, but he is also tall, he is a striker or offensive midfielder and he is left-handed... In that we are similar. But I prefer to say that I am just myself and in every game I want to show who I am."
Early talks with Pioli: "Before signing I talked to Pioli, so I already knew a little bit what he wants. A couple of days ago he showed me with the staff some videos with the style of play he expects from me. I really liked it and I saw myself in that kind of soccer."
In what role? "The one they call trequartista, but I can do other roles. However, this is the role I need to focus on right away. But it's the style of play I like; going deep, having freedom around the point. I'm looking forward to expressing myself in that position."
Are you one of those players who watches videos of other players to learn their movements? "Yes, especially if I have to change roles sometimes I watch videos of those who play in that position to learn and memorize the movements. It's not like every day I watch soccer videos though, I do it sometimes before games."
For example, when you had to watch how a center forward moves, who did you study? "I watched videos of the best strikers in the world like Lewandowski, Benzema... And I forget many others."
What about being a trequartista? "I always really liked De Bruyne, he is one of the best players in Belgium. In my role he is the best, so I watch how he plays."
But in your language there is no word in Belgium for "trequartista"? "No, there is no precise word like in Italian, we just say offensive midfielder."
In Italy every number has a meaning, the one for 90 is "fear," "I didn't know that."
Is there anything that scares you in your life, in your career? "I would say no. I consider myself a humble and calm guy but I believe in myself a lot, and so there is nothing or no one that scares me."
If you could change the meaning of the number 90, which one would you choose? "I think choose 'ambition,' because I am still very young and have a long career ahead of me. I have the ambition to do great things, and so I really think I would choose that."
What is your dream? "I think the most important thing is to win the Champions League, that is my dream. But now I'm at AC Milan, I think it's easier to win it here than in Bruges (laughs, ed.), so I hope to win it sooner or later."
ORIGINAL IN ITALIAN
imagine Adli at DM with one of Tonali or Bennacer. Disastrous even in theory.
Just landed on the full (longer) quote.
