Tuesday, 29 November 2016

Kyle Bartley: Even now when I step out I try to play the game in the Arsenal mould

On-loan defender has played for six clubs in seven years and Leeds United will benefit from all that experience in the EFL Cup quarter-final at Liverpool

Two things are striking about Kyle Bartley: his size and his maturity. As he wanders down a corridor in the Billy Bremner Suite at Elland Road the 25-year-old defender jokes about his 6ft 4in physique: “I think I’m still growing.” Taking a seat in a back room Bartley displays a self-ease gained from overcoming the challenges presented by his peripatetic career.

Leeds United, who play Liverpool on Tuesday night in the EFL Cup quarter-final, is his sixth club since the debut for Arsenal in 2009. “Six clubs and my debut was at 18 so they’ve been over seven years,” he says. “It is tough – by the time I was 21 I’d lived in Wales, England and Scotland. It’s something maybe other people don’t see or hear about on the outside but as a football player it’s part of the game and that’s what you get paid for.”

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