{"id":609374,"date":"2022-01-31T14:28:31","date_gmt":"2022-01-31T19:28:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/?p=609374"},"modified":"2022-01-31T14:28:31","modified_gmt":"2022-01-31T19:28:31","slug":"mk-dons-premier-league-duo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/2022\/01\/31\/mk-dons-premier-league-duo\/","title":{"rendered":"MK Dons Sign Premier League Duo"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/2022\/01\/21\/mk-dons-premier-league-connor-wickham\/\" target=\"_self\">MK Dons<\/a> have completed the deadline day signings of Premier League duo Matt Smith and Kaine Kesler.<\/p>\n<p>Midfielder Smith arrives on a permanent deal from <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/2022\/01\/27\/zalan-vancsa-manchester-city\/\" target=\"_self\">Manchester City<\/a> for an undisclosed fee, while Kesler, a right-wingback, joins on loan from <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/2022\/01\/28\/tottenham-hotspur-and-aston-villa-rodrigo-bentancur\/\" target=\"_self\">Aston Villa<\/a> for the remainder of the campaign.<\/p>\n<p>They become the fourth and fifth additions of the window for Liam Manning&#8217;s side after the signings of Theo Corbeanu, Jamie Cumming and Conor Coventry.<\/p>\n<h2>Premier League Duo Sign for MK Dons<\/h2>\n<h3>Smith Joins From English Champions<\/h3>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">Matt Smith is a Don \u270d\ufe0f<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/DonDeal?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#DonDeal<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/mHoqMHuz1f\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">pic.twitter.com\/mHoqMHuz1f<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Milton Keynes Dons (@MKDonsFC) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/MKDonsFC\/status\/1488225573952438275?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">January 31, 2022<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>Despite being just 22-years-old, Smith joins the Dons having already made over 100 career appearances. The majority of these were made on loan spells at FC Twente and Doncaster Rovers and he has also spent time at Hull City, Charlton Athletic and Queens Park Rangers.<\/p>\n<p>Internationally, Smith has made 15 appearances for Wales and was part of their squad at last year&#8217;s European Championships.<\/p>\n<p>On his move, Smith told the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mkdons.com\/news\/2022\/january\/matt-smith-joins-from-man-city\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">club website<\/a>: \u201cIt was time for me to move on away from City and I don\u2019t think I could have found a better club to join. The facilities here are fantastic and the players and staff seem fantastic too. There is a real project going on here and I wanted to be a part of that.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019ve got a quality squad who have done really well this season \u2013 hopefully I can add to that and help the team achieve its goals.\u201d<\/p>\n<h3>Kesler Comes in on Loan<\/h3>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">Kaine Kesler is a Don \u270d\ufe0f<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/DonDeal?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#DonDeal<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/PLh7Lgo3uG\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">pic.twitter.com\/PLh7Lgo3uG<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Milton Keynes Dons (@MKDonsFC) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/MKDonsFC\/status\/1488195377673162761?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">January 31, 2022<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>The Dons have also completed the signing of defender Kesler from Steven Gerrard&#8217;s Aston Villa.<\/p>\n<p>Kesler, an England U20 international, spent the first half of this season in League Two with Swindon Town.<\/p>\n<p>The 19-year-old captained a young Villains side to FA Youth Cup success in 2021 and made his senior debut for the side against Liverpool just over a year ago.<\/p>\n<p>On the move, he said: \u201cIt was time for me to take the next step in my development and when I heard MK Dons were interested, my head was turned.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe style of play was a massive draw for me &#8211; I\u2019ve been brought up on this style of football at Aston Villa so it suits me perfectly.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Main Photo<\/p>\n<p><a id=\"e0d9CFw0TPJWLY09PIseMA\" class=\"gie-single\" style=\"color: #a7a7a7; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal !important; border: none; display: inline-block;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.co.uk\/detail\/1355160894\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'e0d9CFw0TPJWLY09PIseMA',sig:'P3rLg4CoKXOH37-XB4Fyqsh77QHn26RFddGq9PwkjG0=',w:'594px',h:'396px',items:'1355160894',caption: true ,tld:'co.uk',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>MK Dons have completed the deadline day signings of Premier League duo Matt Smith and Kaine Kesler. Midfielder Smith arrives on a permanent deal from Manchester City for an undisclosed fee, while Kesler, a right-wingback, joins on loan from Aston Villa for the remainder of the campaign. They become the fourth and fifth additions of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1144,"featured_media":609390,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[30,32,34,3,28],"tags":[9157,8820,3935],"class_list":["post-609374","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-league-football","category-league12","category-premier-league","category-transfers","tag-kaine-kesler","tag-liam-manning","tag-matt-smith"],"modified_by":"Nat Goodlad, Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/609374","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1144"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=609374"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/609374\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/609390"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=609374"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=609374"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/football\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=609374"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}