Kelvin Yeboahformer striker of Genoa who today scores with the shirt of Minnesota United in MLS, gave a long interview to Sky Sportstalking about his impact with the new championship: “It’s been excellent. Here the players are freer from tactics, the level is high, the infrastructure is perfect and the championship is unpredictable: it’s the American Dream, everyone has the right to dream and even a big team like Messi and Suarez’s Inter Miami can be beaten in the first round of the play-offs. And then football is entertainment: the show already starts with the choice of pre-match outfits and I, as an Italian, can handle it Well”.
What is a sore point?
“The food… Luckily I found a shop selling Italian products.”
Can you tell us about your time at Genoa?
“They have been complicated months, but I have no regrets: I would do it again. The Genoa fans are fantastic and I have learned a lot: it is in difficult moments that you improve, when the ball doesn’t go in even if you push it with your hands. My uncle helped me Anthony, who was a great striker in the Bundesliga and in the Premier League. And at Genoa I internalized a lesson that is now my mantra: the obstacle is the way. It means not running away from responsibilities and always giving the right maximum. I leave the rest in the hands of God.”
Three different coaches in three games and signings from all over the world. So many difficulties for a debutant in Serie A like her.
“The club had chosen to take two strikers: me and Piatek. In the end, however, only I arrived and, at 21, I took all the responsibility on my shoulders. I was in a good moment, I was even scoring in the Europa League and the project of Spors and Shevchenko had convinced me.”
Why did you choose 45?
“For Balotelli: he wrote me a good luck message. Now he’s the one wearing that very shirt and I reciprocated: I told him to let us have fun.”
His journey starts from Shevchenko.
“I made my debut with him on the bench, in the Italian Cup at San Siro against Milan: a dream. But after that match they sacked him, Konko arrived on an interim basis and on my debut in Serie A we lost 6-0 against Fiorentina “.
Then it was Blessin’s turn.
“I had arrived at Genoa to be a striker but he moved me to the wing. And communication was complicated: the coach was German and the translator didn’t translate from English. So for each exercise, Blessin explained in German, the translator repeated in Italian and then, for those who didn’t understand either language, Blessin explained it again in English, however we understood each other: we fought until the end but we couldn’t save ourselves.”
Cross in Naples, how much do you regret not scoring?
“He’s still shaking: it could have changed our history and mine too, it would have been the first goal in Serie A. But one day I will return to Italy to settle the open account.”