Wolverhampton Wanderers defender Ki Jana Hoever has admitted he struggled with a lack of progress at former club Liverpool.
Hoever joined Wolves in an £8.82m deal from Liverpool’s Under 23 side in September last year, having struggled to make the breakthrough at Anfield.
He made his debut for the Reds aged just 16 against his future employers in the FA Cup back in January 2019, with a debut in the EFL Cup coming in September of the same year.
Appearances beyond that were hard to come by, though, with him only making four appearances in total for Liverpool’s first team.
That’s a tally he’s far surpassed with Wolves, where he is currently up to 17 appearances in all competitions and has a far greater chance under Bruno Lage than he did Jurgen Klopp.
His hope is to be a regular sooner rather than later, a desire which he says caused issues for him at Anfield.
“That I would make my debut within six months, while before that, I played my matches in the Under-17s at Ajax. That all happened very quickly.
“That is also difficult because, after that, it doesn’t go so fast.”
A desire to play regularly has seemingly dominated Hoever’s career, with his initial move to Merseyside coming about because of the same thing.
He initially started his career at Ajax and worked his way up through the youth ranks, eventually reaching their under 17 side and making 13 appearances in total.
Progress up the ladder was too slow for him at that point, though, prompting him to join Liverpool instead.
“That went too slowly for me. I hadn’t thought about the first one at all; I wanted to go to the Under-19 as soon as possible,” he added.
“I was surprised that I was offered a contract from Ajax because I had the feeling for some time that I was not appreciated how I thought I should be appreciated.
“The fact that I made my debut in Liverpool six months later also says that I was at least ready for the Under-19 of Ajax, I think.”
