Jesé Rodríguez signed for Stoke City in August 2017, and the club hyped the transfer so much that it would have been difficult for any player to match what they’d encouraged fans to expect.
He arrived clearly relishing the star status he’d been given, and if anyone didn’t need their ego massaging at the time it was the former Real Madrid man. Stoke City’s repeated tweets bragging about the huge transfer they’d managed to secure always looked like they’d come back to bite, and sure enough, Jesé faced similar problems as he had at Los Blancos and PSG.
On top of questions regarding attitude and fitness, Jesé also had personal problems to deal with, which meant repeat trips to the Canary Islands.
Inevitably, the relationship with Stoke City ended, and there then followed difficult loan moves to Real Betis and Sporting, before a permanent move to Las Palmas.
In the recently concluded season, the 29-year-old scored 11 goals in 41 matches for Las Palmas, who missed out on promotion to the top flight.
Speaking to TMW, Jesé was asked why he didn’t move to Italy in summer 2017, and as part of his answer revealed the Stoke City move was the worst of his career.
“It’s true, I had some important offers from Italy but in the end I made other decisions,” TMW quote him as saying. “In recent years I have worn the shirts of some of the most prestigious clubs in the world and I have won trophies such as La Liga, Copa del Rey, Ligue 1, the French Super Cup, the Champions League, the European Super Cup, the Club World Cup… The worst adventure was certainly the one in Premier League, where for various circumstances I did not feel good.”
