Good God, let's tune it down a bit. X-O, you criticism can easily be applied to your post as well. Someone who doesn't follow Serie A would, reading your post, think Milan got relegated or finished 15th.

Alex and Antonelli did good for most of the season. So did Kucka. Yet, it simply wasn't enough.

We didn't finish 15th, but we finished 7th. Last year we finished 10h. Two years ago we finished 7th again. What are you saying, that this isn't a disgrace? That we should just brush it off as just "not good enough". I'm sorry, but I was raised with a different mentality, the Milan mentality. Every season it was title and Champions League. Every season. Now we can't even qualify for the UEFA Cup. It's simply tragic. There are no other adjectives.

That's what I used to think. I thought Galliani was the poor front man who didn't have the resources so he fudged along and begged around for old past it star players.

And let's face it, he's been making terrible decisions for a while now, forget about last summer. How can you explain all the lavish contracts he gave to players who were too old and past it? Players who they had absolutely no clue about (Traore anyone??), players who other clubs still wouldn't have taken on even if we paid them to do it. Player who were happy to sit on their @sses with us because of the previously mentioned huge salaries given to them because Galliani scavenged them for free.

Now let's get back to last summer, as Filippo said, once again, the focus was on the attack while our terrible midfield was left as is with only the addition of a player who had a decent season at Genoa (forget about his price tag for now which is another issue altogether) How many summers can we go through this now, and I blame the fetish for attackers on Silvio, don't get me wrong there, but every summer we have to go through this and we're still paying for those decisions to this day. Let's not forget that Matri will be coming back from his loan. Let's all remember and cry over that one now. How we finance Juve's move for Tevez by taking that lump off their hands and paying them good money for him as well while once again we were told there was no money to fix the midfield.

Let's also not forget all the favours we've done for Genoa and all the other close friends of Galliani's

It's just ridiculous at this point. The amount of mistakes done by this man to bring us to this dire position we're now in is simply a tragic notion to even comprehend.

This man cannot be allowed to run things any longer simply as that really. And if this sale goes through, the first thing on the agenda should be to get the man out of the way ASAP!


Alex, came the season before, sure he was good this season after spending the previous one injured for the majority of it.
Romagnoli was great and he's one of my few beacons of light in this team. And we can also fully thank Miha for this one as he's the one who pushed hard for him. Let's not give Galliani credit for unearthing a talent here when he had nothing to do with selecting him.
Again, Antonelli wasn't brought in last summer, but again, just like Alex he was simply an opportunistic move from Galliani. Let's not attribute it as some masterstroke that should be repeated in FM for years to come, it could just as easily have gone down the same roads as Mesbah, Taiwo, etc
Bacca... The man is good, but he's 30 years old and imo we overpaid. Not to mention we brought in a striker that's reliant on service to be really effective and left him with basically no midfield behind him. The goal tally is a testament to how good Bacca is, but if a decent offer came for him this summer and we manage to make a profit (highly unlikely) I'd take it and look for someone with different characteristics in attack
Kucka... Don't get me started. Sure he can be mildly impressive when he's bulldozing his way around, but his end product shows how limited he is in general as a midfielder. Had we had Witsel instead of this muppit we would have seen a more dominant midfield throughout the season which could have really helped us out
Niang... Don't want to get into that one
Balo... Same thing, Galliani just never learns his lesson. And don't get me wrong here I like Balo very much, but at this point Milan clearly is not the right environment for him to flourish or to get over his issues


Agreed


I could have told you how sh!t the Berto transfer was from day 1 man, the man is clearly weak, both in mind and body. He was never going to be good enough to justify that kind of price tag and tbh, now that the season is over I'm even surprised that he turned out worse than I expected.

And it's not simply about seeing which player didn't justify his price tag so we quantify the transfer window as that one bad transfer. You have to look at the entire picture and simply ask, were the transfers we made good enough to improve the team from last season? And you compare that to the kind of money we spent... A jump of 3 places from 10th to 7th after spending nearly a 100m says it all for me. The true problems of the squad imo were not addressed and that is why it was a terrible transfer season. At least before we could at least fall back on the old excuse that there was no money. But after a 100m? And still this pitiful side is presented to us to endure another terrible season? No, just unacceptable from Galliani


Yep


Agreed there

Have to agree with pretty much everything you said, Han.

Galliani used to be reasonably good, but he is way past his better days. Last decade has been going from bad to worse, starting with the ridiculous deals made with players after our CL win, and ending with (most of) 100M flushed down the toilet (with many sad chapters in between). And (as has already been said) it is not so much the individual decisions, but the "big picture": consistently investing in the wrong places, expense levels that are well past unreasonable (reference recent stockholder meeting), laughable coach selections, endless "bickering" between Galliani + Barbara + Silvio, no new stadium, and so on. All of this spells M-I-S-M-A-N-A-G-E-M-E-N-T.

At this point I am hoping that the sale goes through (sadly not a done deal IMHO), Berlu gets relegated to a "PR role" (or removed entirely), and Galliani is gone for good. Unless that happens, I fear the downward spiral will continue, and we may start looking at 7th place as "success". FWIW, the alternative proposed by Berlu (an "Italian Milan") could have potential, but with our current inept management it is not going to end well IMHO. With Inter now well-funded again, we risk becoming "the other team" in Milano (kind of like Torino has been for some time).

Berlusca needs a heart surgery. Hope he stays healthy, but the timing sort of sucks. Worried how the deal will progress now.

I wish him well, I really do. Despite all of my complaints about the current situation, as a Milan fan I owe him a great deal of appreciation and respect for many years of consistent success (not to mention rescuing the team from near-disaster).

That said, not sure what impact it will have. May act as the catalyst to get the deal done, or as a cause for delay. Will see ...

Well at the end of the day, all he has to do is give his go-ahead, and he can do that just fine even from a bed. Fininvest is the holding company of Milan and negotiations are still on-going. Last I read they've said that things are still progressing just fine but the deadline could be extended to the end of the month because of Berlu's issues

Sorry, have to disagree with this bit. And this coming from an Azzurri fan. The talent pool in Italy is simply not good enough atm, not if we want to truly be successful. And the only real top class Italian player around atm is in France.

Sure there are the Juve guys but aside from Marchisio, they're all getting a bit long in the tooth.

The Italian Milan idea is a terrible one imo, and just shows how out of touch Silvio is

I believe that the idea is to look for "new talent" rather than established players. But it does not matter, even if Italy was full of talent you need a capable management team for something like this to work.

Well, that's part of the problem in and of itself, I don't see all that many young players coming through who are good enough to be starters in a Serie A side.

And personally I don't think the infrastructure is really there to really start producing players in a similar way that countries like Germany, Belgium, Spain and France do. And this is not just at Milan but at the nation as a whole

Even though I hope Milan gets sold and we dont have to go with Berlusconis Ital-Milan plan, but if we dont sell then desperate times call for desperate measures so I think that the idea is to buy and develop Italian talents from 16 to 20 years old and to introduce them in to the squad but only as backups and in rotations in first two or three years. Its obvious that we would need 3-4 years to clean our team from non Italian players.

Even though in my opinion Ital-Milan doesnt mean that we dont have any foreign player, but that the core of the squad will be Italian players. Also, we should get rid even some Italian players that dont deserve our jersey like Matri and so on.

So just because there are not so many good Italian players right now, that doesnt mean that there wont be, we just have to concentrate more in youth program and develop our players. For ex. when I remember that we had Aboumeyang and Darmiani but we wasted them, it makes me think that we have not been the best team to develop youngers. Young players need time, even though they can upset us in the beginning, thats why I think that Ely, Calabria, De Sciglio need more chances and support and I felt the same way about El Shaarawy but I think now its to late for him.

Think the new owners will take the reigns and assume a transition period for key people like galliani. There will be a change alright, not sure if that will translate to a stellar team or stellar individuals. I'm with the former, and that will depend on the new owner's strategy, the new management qualifications to meet the strategy and the general attitude of the locker room.

I would like for Milan to play with an identity worthy of the clubs history.

You think this deal will go through any time soon?

At this rate the entire summer will be over with the deal continuing to be delayed and our transfer business completely stalled due to not having a budget available

Logically speaking han, wouldn't someone coming in with EUR 750M to buy the club in whole have a plan for the coming season?

Seriously.

Let's all just pray that is the case because atm it's not looking very good for us. We can't close deals for the players we want and can't seem to offload the players we don't need either

Mo! Are you up for a visit to the San Siro this season? kurt, dst and I might be going...hopefully to catch the Derby della Madonina...if we're lucky to get tickets.

Thats a great idea, yeah for sure let me know which dates and ill meet you guys there:)

We're thinking the Derby Della Madonina, so sometime in November. Have no clue how to go about getting tickets and all though. We'll see. If you're coming we have an experienced 'tour guide'.

Sounds like the "exclusivity clause" has expired, and new potential buyers may have emerged.

Don't know if it's a good thing or a bad one at this point.

I don't either. Perhaps the pressure from new potential buyers may expedite matters. OTOH, if this means that we may go with a new buyer, then we have taken several steps backwards.

As much as I am trying to be patient, I would like this over, new owner and proper management. I have kind of given up on this coming season (too late in the market to make an impact), but I would like to see light at the end of the tunnel.

New investors would be a million steps back at this point when we're supposedly in the final stages with this consortium.

All while having all transfer activity frozen with no budget to speak of, any further delays will continue to hurt the club as we're reportedly also going to lose about 30 to 40m in sponsorship deals as there are more than a few which are about to expire, namely D&G and we can't sign any extensions because the ownership of the club is in question

We're in a very precarious moment for this club and I honestly do think that if this deal falls through we'll be in free fall. With Fininvest no longer wanting to cover the losses, I honestly don't know what would be next for this club

It seems we've reach an agreement and the signing of a 740 million worth deal will go through in matter of hours.

[MN]

AC Milan is made in China now?

It's official. 99,3% of shares sold for 740 million euros (including debt).

欢迎新业主
Huānyíng xīn yèzhǔ
Welcome new owners

*99,93%

Finally!

If what this says is true, we (as Milan fans) owe Berlu big time. In addition to almost 30 years of (mostly) glory (ignoring the last few years, of course ), apparently Berlu insisted on contractual guarantees that the new owners will invest adequately in the club.

This apparently frees up 15M now, 85M more within 35 days, and 100M when the deal closes. Not enough to re-build the team, but if used wisely enough to get us to stay reasonably competitive. And with Gancikoff involved, I have a feeling that Galliani will be under tighter control.

Feeling a lot happier. (Though will remain concerned until we close.)

Actually terms of signing the sale binds the Chinese to invest eur350m over three years (inclusive of the 100m spread out -> 15 now and 85 within 30 days of signing the contract).

The contract is 99.9% of Milan against payment of eur740m to acquire the club -> 520 to Fininvest and 220 to the banks.

FINALLY!!

We can celebrate!

Apparently it's being reported that the buyers are not the consortium lead by Sal Galatiato and Gancikoff. This bring a whole new set of question marks but I'm so glad it's finally done and we can more forward from this limbo we've been stuck in

Also, one of the major players in the consortium is this corporation Click. They're state owned, so it's safe to say we have some serious financial muscle behind us now

Who knows. I've read some comments from Italian business people who say that having a state-owned corporation on board makes things less smooth. I'm not gonna celebrate just now; let's wait a bit.

Di Marzio is mentioning Cuadrado as a possibility. Sosa as well. Also, Zaza if Bacca leaves. I seriously fail to see why we're still trying to push Bacca out. And why Sosa again? Remind me, what did he do recently to deserve so much attention and fight from our behalf?

Btw. why not try to catch Schweinsteiger? He's on a downward curve but he'd still do great things with us here.

I've been wondering about Bastian as well, he'd be a great addition and would elevate our midfield.

Atm, I'm just going to wait and see, it's clear from how this sale unfolded that no media outlet, not even the big financial ones even, knew wtf was going on. They were guessing dates and when it was clear it wasn't going to happen they'd say there's been another delay and give us another date, and so on and so forth. Only for it to happen out of the blue on the 5th of August when no one was expecting it.

Atm, I don't think Galliani himself knows what he's allowed to do or not to do in the transfer market. his very position at the club is up in the air and I don't think he'll be here past the closing date.

I personally don't think there will be a cash injection until the deal is completely closed in October, so atm I think we should slow down with the expectations. But I do believe that there will be heavy investment once this thing is completely done. Fininvest even disclosed this in their official press release about the sale, something they wouldn't do unless they were certain of it.

The media is saying that Lapadula and Gomez were signed through the 15m deposit, which is a stupid observation to make as they cost more than that and we sold SES as well this summer for 13m IIRC. The media is just pulling things out at random atm by making baseless observations.

And if our budget was really 15m, I would hope that Galliani wouldn't be stupid enough to waste all of it on a Serie B striker and an unknown defender playing in S.America.

I really hope we can use the loan + obligation formula to secure a couple of good deals. Still hoping for Kovacic. Our midfield is still dire and it seems we're focusing on every area of the team aside from this one, which would be typical of B & G but I'm hoping Montella will push for a couple of decent mids as his system would be useless with the current crop we have

Kovacic or Isco are mandatory IMO. One of them has to leave and we should use this new ownership as an "ambitious project" reasoning to lure them in. I also reas that we're now serious for Cuadrado.

I agree that we are dealing with a lot of confusing and contradicting info, and much of what is being reported is probably wrong. I believe the 15M was not available prior to the signing of the prelim agreement, which means maybe it covers Gomez but not Lapadula. As I already said, we are not getting enough to build the team we all would like to see, but we may have enough to deal with some of the more glaring problems.

I would not celebrate until the deal has closed and we know more about the new management (to use a line from one of my favorite movies, "it could be worse, it could be raining"). However, at least something appears to be changing, and that is enough to lift my spirits.

We are pushing Bacca out because he is not part of Montella's plans and he can bring us money now (if Montella does not play him, his value will drop).

Potential replacement for Galliani. I see Marco Fassone mentioned in other articles as well.

And much confusion regarding our buyers

Republica, while referencing the Chinese Business Circle are saying that Xi Jinping, is behind the consortium, with other private entities as well as state owned ones also being involved (named: Moutai (State owned), Baidu, Evergrande, and Wang Jianlin (Richest man in China ahead of Jack Ma))

We'll just have to wait and see if these names are correct, but I'm 100% sure that the Chinese government is involved heavily in this

Who cares, just give us money.

I think it's important to know the financial strength of the new owners. If the ones mentioned in my above post are true, then we're in business.

Nevermind the last few years. But anyone feeling a tad sentimental about Berlusconi leaving after 30 years?

Not really to be honest. Things have just deteriorated to the point where all I feel is relief that this thing is finally done

It is the end of an era, and (despite the last few years) I think we should be extremely grateful for all Berlu has done for the club. Having said this, a change of ownership as well as a change of management have become a necessity. So yes, there is a touch of sadness, but overall I am happy (and a little concerned at the same time, "change" does not necessarily mean "improvement").

Same.

He was named player of the year in the Turkish league if I'm not mistaken.

I think, just like we reflect on the Carlo days today, we will reflect on Silvio's Era tomorrow. When we figure out that it wasn't all of Galliani doing after all but just how life is not always perfect like that

But yes I feel a lot of sentimental attachment to Silvio's ownership of Milan. To an extent that he is the sole person after God responsible for Milans run over the last 30 years. And today, it is being transfered to China, whom Silvio has accepted a lower valuation of the club to just receive eur 520m and the rest 570m to milan (pay debt qnd transfers). That is a show of affection from the President to his club. Truly is. Forever grateful.

I think we can agree on being grateful to Berlu

As for the rest, reality is that Milan has been managed very badly (certainly in recent years, possibly going even further in the past). That has resulted in a number of very poor decisions that have contributed to our current state. Do compare our sorry state to what Juve (which is managed as a proper business) can achieve on the market these days, and to take into account that until recently revenues for the two clubs were not that far apart. Also, do refer back to the recent stockholder meeting, and all of the issues that were brought up back then. The overall picture is very, very far from perfect. So it may not be "all of Galliani doing", but as the "man in charge" he shoulders much of the blame.

On a separate note, Inter is not doing all that well either. Yes, they have more money, but they have not spent it very wisely and Mancini leaving a few weeks before the start of the season is not encouraging.

Some scary news about our new investors, with allegations of false documents being used to get Berlu to agree to the deal (some of these allegations have apparently been confirmed by one of the Chinese banks). It sounds like the new investors are not as "solid" as they represented themselves, and may have to rely on help from Chinese banks, at least for a transition period. If so, the club will be effectively run by banks, which is probably not good news in terms of what we might be able to spend for players.