Atletico Madrid boss Diego Simeone insists out-of-favour striker Nikola Kalinic ‘must keep working’ if he is to earn more first-team minutes.
The Croatian striker, a summer arrival from Milan, has started just two games for Los Rojiblancos across La Liga and the Champions League this season and featured for just two minutes at Leganes on Saturday.
“Nikola needs to continue working and fighting,” Simeone is cited as telling reporters by Marca.
“We have full faith in all our players, he has played in the Copa del Rey and played two minutes (on Saturday), and Gelson is featuring more for us now too.
“Our second half was very good, I have no complaints, but in the first half we did not play as we had aimed to play.
“We needed more creativity and flair, that’s why we used Gelson after his Copa performance, because we had been too deep in the first half.”
