American midfielder Weston McKennie said his loan spell at Leeds United in 2023 was the lowest point of his career, adding that he was subjected to racist abuse during his time playing in the Premier League.
McKennie, 25, joined Leeds in January 2023 as the club looked to strengthen its squad in a bid to avoid relegation to the Championship.
McKennie, who will play for the USMNT at home in the Copa América this month, made 20 appearances for Leeds in all competitions but failed to score a single goal as the club confirmed their relegation on the final day of the season. McKennie has been linked with a return to the Premier League this summer.
“My time at Leeds was probably one of my lowest points, if not the lowest point of my professional career,” McKennie said in an interview with The Athletic.
“I always see the positive because I was at Juventus, playing week after week, and maybe I developed a bit of comfort or complacency knowing that I was going to play on the weekend. Going to Leeds and having the performance that I had there and the The way it turned out overall: four coaches in five months, nothing just went as planned or as I imagined.
“When I went there, my head was more: 'Okay, I want to go here, play very well, put up numbers, help the team stay up and then, hopefully, another Premier League team, in the top five, comes along. and see how well I played and then they would buy me.'”
As Leeds' results in the second half of the 2022–23 season did not improve, relations between the club and its fan base deteriorated to the point that fans booed the team and criticized players during matches and in social networks.
“I like to think of myself as someone who has thick skin,” McKennie said. “When you get little comments here and there, it's pretty easy to ignore them. But then when you open your phone and the first thing you see on social media is always something negative, it's hard to ignore it.
“I guess it's hard for me because I love it when people identify with me and I feel like I'm always a happy person.
“Football is a world where it's unforgiving at times. People obviously don't know what football players go through and the stress that players put on themselves to perform, because it's not that we want to perform badly.
“It's not that we want to lose games. It's just that sometimes you have ups and downs, so it hurts.”
“It was probably the first time, apart from the World Cup elimination.” [in 2022] where I cried, after the last game of the season at Leeds, when we were officially relegated. I hate losing and I felt like I really disappointed people's expectations of me going there.
“When people started attacking me, as a person in general, not even in football, everyone knew that I have thicker bones than other players, in the sense that my body shape is the way it is. But when people started saying, 'Fat bastard' and 'pig' and 'monkey' and stuff like that, people don't really realize the effect it has on people.
“I like to be happy and make people happy, make people laugh. So that was a little difficult.”
McKennie rediscovered his form in the 2023-24 season after returning to parent club Juventus, making 34 Serie A appearances and helping the club win the Coppa Italia.
