The midfielder of Kharkiv “Metalist 1925” Ivan Kaluzhny shared that during the winter transfer window he held negotiations about a transfer with the German “Hertha” and the English “Plymouth”.
Ivan Kaluzhny. Photo — FC “Metalist 1925”“The option with ‘Hertha’ was more than real. We met with the leaders of this club. When we started communicating with them, we outlined our conditions, and they responded: yes.
Then negotiations were held, I told them: ‘If you want, I can transfer now, just talk.’ But when there were 5−7 days left before the transfer window closed, they said: ‘Let’s do it in the summer.’ I said I wouldn’t want to wait until summer.
There were very tough negotiations with ‘Alexandria’: the club didn’t want to let me go even in winter. Yes, they understood they would lose money, but, as I was told, for them the result that season was more important than money.
With ‘Plymouth’ everything was also concrete, just like with ‘Hertha’. I had already sent my passport, but I wanted ‘Hertha’ more. Because at that time ‘Plymouth’ was at the bottom of the Championship, 9 points away from the safe zone. I thought they wouldn’t stay in the division. But then they got a chance to get out of that hole — the team started getting good results (as a result, ‘Plymouth’ still dropped out of the Championship, — ed. note).
Later, when Talovirov began to play for ‘Plymouth’ (Maxim Talovirov moved to this club in January, — ed. note), I watched the team’s matches and saw that the atmosphere there was the same as in the Bundesliga. But we made that decision because at that time I wasn’t alone, there were agents, and together we made that choice.
The choice in favor of ‘Metalist 1925’? This is a club from my hometown. At that time, there was hope that the war would end and I could return home. Yes, my family and I considered moving abroad, I have two small children. But it turned out that we stayed, and we are happy here,” Kaluzhny said on the YouTube channel “TaToTake”.
