CM: De Ketelaere hopes to haunt Milan again – what didn’t work after his €32m arrival

AC Milan will once again come up against Charles De Ketelaere at the New Balance Arena on Tuesday night, as they face Atalanta.

De Ketelaere isn’t the only ex-Milan player in their ranks, with Mario Pasalic and Yunus Musah also there, but he’s certainly the one that generates the feeling of ‘what might have been’.

As Calciomercato.com recall, he was sent on loan to La Dea after a disappointing first season at Milan, and Gian Piero Gasperini revived him by returning him to his natural role as second striker. Now Ivan Juric is in charge, but the Belgian remains a starter.

What didn’t work at Milan

De Ketelaere arrived after a long and exhausting negotiation with Club Brugge (sound familiar?) after the Scudetto-winning season in 2021-22. He didn’t score a single goal in 32 appearances, and went to Atalanta.

After scoring four goals early into his time there, CDK sent a message in an interview with DAZN: “The position gives me more confidence in my game. I’m not a player who can run 12km, but I can produce a lot of intensity. In this position, I can do it better and I also feel stronger in the actions I carry out.”

It was a message that had a clear recipient: Stefano Pioli. Although he racked up 1,101 minutes played in the league and six appearances in the Champions League (235 minutes) plus one in the Coppa Italia (120 minutes), the feeling is that Pioli never figured out a plan to make things work.

There was undoubtedly a tactical incompatibility with Pioli’s ideas. The coach himself admitted this in an interview with La Gazzetta dello Sport: “Gasperini did a great job finding the right position for him in attack. We already had Giroud and Leao. We needed someone who could also work further back.

“Then he grew athletically and found the right fit in Bergamo. San Siro and the AC Milan shirt mean a lot. Charles is very strong, but he struggled in the Dublin final, and last year against us too: Thiaw cancelled him out. He still has to learn to handle heavy pressure. He’s young. We certainly didn’t make a mistake in signing him.”

Pioli helped develop the likes of Rafael Leao, Theo Hernandez, Ismael Bennacer, Sandro Tonali and others, and he tried everything with De Ketelaere. He used him across the attacking line, giving him license to roam and create, and to score goals that never came.

The Belgian never showed any signs of improvement, however, and by December 2022 he had ended up on the bench. De Ketelaere wasn’t ready for the leap, despite the fact that club scouts had been studying him for at least two years.

The purchase made sense from a technical standpoint, but the forward suffered from the pressure of a stadium like San Siro and from the €32m+ price tag on his shoulders. After scoring against Milan last season in a 2-1 home win, De Ketelaere wants to show he was actually worthy every penny.