Inter Ace Announces Return from Injury, Makes Big Claim

Hakan Calhanoglu will stay on the mend for the midweek match against Empoli due to a thigh issue, but he believes he’ll be ready for the following game against Venezia. He spoke about that and more to La Gazzetta dello Sport.

“I’ll be back soon. I think I’ll be available again on Sunday.”

The Turk commented on the recent Derby d’Italia.

“It was spectacular. We played a good game and we were a bit unlucky, but we fared very well, and we could have won. It’s true that we could have scored seven or eight goals, but the same goes for Juventus. In the end, it was a balanced match. That kind of bouts is always unpredictable.”

Calhanoglu heaped praise on Piotr Zielinski.

“He was good, as it wasn’t easy to play in that role after doing something else on the pitch for years. He did a great job and helped the team a lot. Kudos to him. He even bagged two PKs, which means that somebody else can take them in my place. I’ll miss one eventually, unfortunately. Hopefully, it’ll happen as late as possible.”

Calhanoglu addressed his 20^th-placed finish in the Balloon d’Or voting.

“It’s a very big satisfaction for me. I’m happy and proud at the same time. Lautaro Martinez, Yann Sommer, and I represented Inter in such an important award. I hope there’ll be more of us in the future. It would mean that we had a very important season. Inter continue to be at the top in Europe. In my opinion, we are one of the best five clubs in the world. I’m fairly sure of that.”