You forgot losing one of the best goalkeepers in the world for free. Yes, even though I do not blame Maldini & co. for that, it's still technically their responsibility.

The points you raise are all valid, and they make our mercato look mediocre (even though portals like Mediaset are rating it highly at 7).

My personal opinion is that while Kessie and Romagnoli's contracts can still be renewed, and failing to get rid of Conti and Samu while not losing money is quite a difficult task, the failure to properly strengthen the centre-right of the attacking midfield is what really makes Maldini lose points.

I will talk about Messias separately in another post, but the fact that our answer to replacing our starting AM, after finally returning in the CL 7 years later, is a guy who 5 years ago was delivering washing machines is a huge blow. To the club's image, reputation, and the fans' expectations.

We could and should have exploited different options. I hear Faivre wasn't signed because Brest all of a sudden decided not to sell him and closed their doors. And that's alright, but it's not alright that it happened in the last day of the window, and we had to make a panic buy in the end to make up for it

Why did we leave everything in the very end? It's a clear sign of inadequate planning and lack of ideas to operate.

Thay believe that better deals can be made in the last week. But situations like this can also happen in the last days as clubs don't have time to make replacements.

The issue is that Faivre was probably 3rd or 4th choice. It's crazy that there were so many attacking mids on the market and we failed to replace the one we lost.

Seeing Vlasic move to a mid table EPL side stings the most. All while qe spent more than 28 million signing small pickings we lost the perfect replacement for Hakan.

Donnarumma I cannot blame them as the difference between what we were offering, which was a very good deal btw, to what they were asking for was not small. I'm happy he's gone actually as this was always going to be a problem with him when it came time to renew. And have a keeper on 20m gross is a luxury we cannot afford. Watching him warm PSG's bench every week actually fills me with great joy

The window is shut, my personal rating is 7/10; obviously the 10 would be for when the management brings in a household name, which is unrealistic considering the precarious financial circumstances Maldini pointed out.

An 8 or 9 rating would be given if they had closed with an AM of experience who can hold his weight both in Serie A and CL.

That said, it's not a bad Mercato... The club brought in many new faces and elements. Not so sure about the last signing, but hope he proves me wrong.

It is what it is, this Milan will hurt you if you cling to the Berlusconi days, as it's a different animal to that. Today is about self sustainability and keep the books in check to sell the club. Then it was, take the club into financial insolvency but conquer Europe and the world, and don't worry I'll bail you out everytime (by I, meaning Berlusconi). Two very different animals.

Edit: Nonetheless 73.2M spent this window, with additional 53M if the currently loaned players are to be retained next summer.

7/10, now let's see if the team can keep a winning streak going.

This post has been edited by Rossoneri7: Sep 1 2021, 08:06 AM

Regarding Messias, I will say this.

I've seen plenty of clips online, heard technical evaluations of people who actually watched him play, and consulted the overall stats of his last season, and I'm fairly impressed.

He's a jolly that can comfortably play as AM or RW. Despite prevalently being an offensive player, he was frequently employed as CM at Crotone in their 3-5-2 due to his shrewd tactical awareness.

He's physically fit. Last season he made 36 appearances always playing the full 90 minutes, scoring 9 goals and offering 4 assists. Calhanoglu, who played for a much better team, scored only 4 goals, and most of his assists came from corner and free kicks.

He's quite technically gifted. He's the only player alongside De Paul that completed more than 100 dribbles last season (105) in Italy, and also completed the most dribbles of any Brazilian player in the top five European leagues. Yes, even more than Neymar (87).

If you just consider all of this without looking at his age, the particulars of his story, or the context of his signing, the guy appears to be a very decent addition. I certainly don't think he's the name we should have gone after, but now that he's here I will let the field do the talking.

This post has been edited by X-Offender: Sep 1 2021, 11:06 AM

I like that perspective. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/devilsmiley.gif) . I mean sure we now speak about 30 yr olds like they're past their primes, but I do truly believe that players if they are in the right conditions and have the right motivation (like Messias seems to have) could truly blossom late in their career. Kjaer is a perfect example. Sure, we won't have a player for 10 years, but honestly when has a player stayed with the team this long in recent club history. But, we'll have someone who'll give his all to the team. His best might not be enough for us, but let's just give him a chance. For example, Samu who I think is very good dribbler to be honest and a decent player, will never be good in the Serie A...it's just a matter of physicality. as well. On the other hand, Messias has that Serie A experience, let's see if he'll be able to do that jump mentally in a big club.

I mean in some games last year, I was just watching us play and was saying oh well we won't this match because we're playing the likes of Samu or Krunic because of injuries. But this year, even though we haven't signed that marquee player, we added immense depth.

For the striker position we have Ibra, Giroud, Pellegri (tbh, I have no idea about him, but I'm hoping we won't have to rely on the kid).

For the attacking midfield: we now have Junior and Brahim (which I think will be the starting AM).

On the right: Saelmakers but also Junior can fit the bill there too.

On the left: Rebic and Leao are pretty good options

Midfield and Defence: We all know we're pretty stacked in that department at the moment.

In short, we have a very very good squad. There are some questions marks here and there, and sure I would have liked someone like Bernardo Silva, but let's embrace that this project has been successful for the last two years, and hopefully we will keep pushing for better.

(IMG:style_emoticons/default/devilsmiley.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/devilsmiley.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/devilsmiley.gif)

Giroud positive to Covid...

Hopefully he's vaccinated.

Now that the transfer window closed, I have to say - are you guys aware how Serie A got plundered this summer?

I can't think of a single window that depleted Serie A in the way Summer of 21 did. All major clubs bar Napoli lost at least one marquee player.

This is maybe the first time in decades that Serie A does not have a single star player left.

Ronaldo, Lukaku and Hakimi. Who else?

It's a trend that has been going since the late 2000s, this season Bein (who have the rights for the middle east and north Africa) to all major football events such as CL Epl LA Liga Bundesliga Legue1 El EC WC, etc did not provide adequate bid for Serie A.

Serie A was left out of this region and now airs 'free' on youtube until it is able to get TV rights for this region. Considering Bein has the monopoly in the football and sports in this region, Serie A will most likely have to accept lower TV rights than it used to get in order to secure something..

Us Serie A fans have a lot of attachment to our respective clubs and the league, but the world viewership is not what it used to be. And money is not being brought into the league, so players leave and TV rights are much lower than the others.

With the above in mind, the trend is completely identical with what you are saying... It is why Silvio sold Milan, Morratti sold inter and Sensi sold Roma.


Then we can look at the next summer window, with even more players likely to leave on a free, such as Kessie from Milan and God knows who else from other clubs. The fact that we prefer not to look at is that the allure for this league is far from what it was in the 80s and 90s, when WE were growing up and watching magical Milan teams cruising into CL and World football. Today where is Milan? In a group of death in CL and the whole world is looking at Milan as underdogs, when onceapon a time Milan would have easily been favored to top the group.

Sad

Yes, it is a problem. I think the summer PSG started spending big was also a bad summer for the league since Leonardo only seems to be aware of players who play in Italy...

I don't know if it happened all in the same summer, but Italy lost players like Ibra, Thiago, Pastore, Lavezzi, Cavani, Veratti, Marquinhos and probably some others that I cannot remember all to PSG. It didn't all happen in one summer but it was a relatively short space of time

The important thing is that the league continues to unearth these gems and turn them into star players. It gives the clubs liquidity while the league stays relatively strong.


Donnarumma also probably fits into that category

This Kessie situation is seemingly running away from the club, now Gazzetta are saying he refused our latest offer of 6.5m. I don't know if there is any truth to this and the journalist who reported it rarely gets anything right (Laudisa). And the media outlets obviously smell blood in the water since they know Milan fans are anxious about it so any contradictory story will get them clicks

That being said, I am more and more worried about this and if they do end up losing him as well for free than the management will lose the support of the fans. Because this would now be the third time they've let this happen. And with the other two it was somewhat understandable, with Kessie it is not.

I also don't believe the numbers the media is throwing around. Every week the number get's bumped up by 0.5m. Like clockwork. Now the request is seemingly 8.5m. These reports make no sense. I still think Kessie wants around 5.5m to 6m and we're reluctant to go above 4m.

Either way, whether it is 6m or 8m we need to give it to him. If the club does not think this is sustainable in the long run, we can sell him in summer 22 when the club would have a much stronger negotiating position than it would have in January with just a few months left on his contract.

It would make absolutely no financial sense to let him leave for free

Our management have raised serious question marks about how they are handling these renewals. You look at Real, Liverpool, etc. All are pro-active when it comes to keeping their important players on long term deals. Why are we letting these contracts run down? Why have we not renewed Theo and Bennacer for example. Is it because they want to benefit from their current low salaries? This is a double edged sword an we've seen how damaging it could be to play this game

Yeah, it's terrible. It's so terrible that if this goes on, everything we've build can be put down the drain. We're not even here following the plans of Arsenal where they sell their players. We are just developing players and selling them for free. I agree that the management need to be much more active with this. I believe that Maldini will prefer to resign if this situation is true IMO. Let's see maybe in the off transfer window all the contract negotiation will happen.

It's a huge question mark. I personally cannot give any explanation whatsoever, because 1) if Kessie is indeed requesting 7-8M then it's unsustainable as per corporate policies, but 2) if management is not going beyond 4M then it's understandable why Kessie is not bulging. Lautaro for example was on 1,5M at Inter, soon he's expected to sign a new contract at 6M. He's their best player so that makes sense, just like it would make sense to give 6M to Kessie cos he's our best player.

But then again we can always renew his contract as per his demands and then sell him in '22 as Han said.

The only thing that makes NO SENSE is to let him go for free. I don't know why this is a recurring issue at this club. It's almost as if management is content to let players go and not earn a cent. I really, really don't understand it...

Could it possibly be because of the amortisation stuff?

Because otherwise it would not make sense