Kerkez opens up on time at Milan and why he decided to leave: “I deserved a chance” | OneFootball

Milos Kerkez has finally spoken out about his time at AC Milan and shed some light on why he decided to leave the club after such a short time.

The Hungarian left-back was brought in by the Rossoneri in February of last year and he had a lot of buzz around him. However, he never came close to making an appearance for the first team and played with the Primavera instead.

Kerkez sparked some controversy on Twitter after the move as he published a rather distasteful message to Milan over the lack of first-team minutes. He deleted it quickly and then published a more professional message.

He is now thriving at AZ Alkmaar where he is part of the first choice starting line-up and he spoke to Scouted Football about his time with Milan from his arrival at the club to training with the first team and eventually decided to leave. MilanNews relayed his comments.

How did you end up joining Milan?

“There was a lot of interest in me during the winter. Everything was going fast because the period was like this. I actually wanted to stay in Hungary to grow physically and leave in the summer,” he said.

“Two days before the window closed, Maldini called me personally, he wanted a meeting with me and my father, we talked, and it was a great attraction for me. When Maldini calls you, you’re not thinking too much.

“After that it was obvious that I would go to Milan. It was a great club and when they want you like this you can’t say no. In the Primavera you have many really talented young players and there you can grow tactically, which was good for me, I was determined to prove myself.

What is Italian football like?

“Football is different everywhere. In Italy we expect a more tactical football, in Hungary it was more physical, now in the Netherlands it is a wider football with rapid changes in both defence and attack.

“In my experience in Italy, it is always about tactics. Also in the Primavera we did an hour and a half of video analysis after each game. It was a lot of video analysis and analysis of free kicks, so I grew a lot tactically to play smart and use my head more in field. I think it was a good learning experience and the perfect way to grow.”

How was training with the AC Milan first team squad?

“It was crazy to train with the first team. The first time I went there, and I was looking around, there was Ibra, Hernández and Leão. It was really new to me. I saw them on TV two months ago and now I was training with them.

“It was amazing, but it was a really good experience. They were all good guys. At the same time I wanted to challenge myself, I was training very hard in training. I wanted to show myself to the coach and show that I can be a part of the team.”

Who have you studied the most?

“I watched Théo Hernández a lot. I still do. He taught me a lot in attacking play, like how to run inside space, how to make more space with the speed we have and how to use our speed in the best way.”

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“I expected to play more in the first team afterwards. I expected to have a chance because I was doing better than any Primavera full-back from any team. But unfortunately it didn’t happen that way.

“Milan are obviously a great club and it is not easy when young to have a chance there. But I think with my performances and what I did maybe I deserved a chance, but you know that every club has its own philosophy on how they work with young people, so in the end I decided because of this I wanted go and play football with the seniors.”

Milan initially offered you the chance to go on loan, but your entourage was determined to grant him a permanent contract to make sure your career didn’t go wrong…

“We had a lot of offers to go on loan, but being a player on loan is a risky situation. Maybe the team wants to play with their academy player instead of you, so I didn’t like the loan decision very much. I wanted a permanent transfer if possible, and it was really hard because Milan didn’t want to give me up so easily.”

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