If we do sell Pato and buy Tevez and don’t reinforce our midfield with an Eriksen, Gotze, Oezil or similar I will simply have to learn to care less about Milan and football in general. I began to think of myself as a hardcore supporter in ’02 after we got Inzaghi and I simply fell in love with our family atmosphere most notably the treatment of Albertini. This was after years of wandering around, supporting clubs on the basis of my favourite player.

But now, the rumors facing us in this particular mercato might be the final straw. I don’t mind my favourite player(s) leaving. The fact that I’m still a Milan fan after Ronaldo’s and Kaka’s departure to me underlines my commitment to the club as I love not just those players but the persons as well. Losing $heva was tough too but his kissing the Chel$ki badge and the bs about his wife wanting the kids to speak English pissed me off.
Getting Tevez and tossing Pato who, for better or worse is at present close to the Berlusconi family to me is indicative of the erosion of these family values. The commitment to youth can go to. From now on (please keep in mind that this entire rant is contingent on how we deal with the Pato-Tevez saga) any talk of “family atmosphere” will be seen as a poorly disguised attempt to save money by keeping senators past their due date in order to save some ca$h that is needed on new transfers.

Additionally the excessive attention played to media attractions that generally have NOTHING to do with improving the team shows that we might have lost the plot entirely. We have been begging, pleading and bleeding goals at the left back position. This issue has not been addressed adequately and one is forced to wonder if a player of Taiwo’s stature hadn’t been free whether we’d have made any genuine serious effort at all. Instead of plugging the HOLES in the team that we’ve had since ~2008 we have sought to build a cheap quick fix scudetto winner…slowly we are turning to Inter….fugly destruction football with technically average players (god help us if we really do get Muntari) who are physical bullies…..is this what I used to think was Milan philosophy? Because everything from the unimaginative unambitious coach to the players he loves, to the RETARDED TRANSFER MOVES screams PRINTER.

Then too football is, at least to me in a general decline. The quality of the game, the purity of it is getting lost. It’s becoming mechanical and robotic. I’ve been one of the fiercest critics of Pirlo, but it pains me to see the gradual extinction of players of his ilk ( thoughtful, technical) disappear in favour of ridiculously specialized players, bodyguards, sprinters and powerlifters. I remembered the not too distant past when our Pirlo-Seedorf-Gattuso-Rui Costa Mildield played the ball on the ground, down the middle with ruthless efficiency and at will. Now, Barcelona aside the whole world is becoming the Premi3r$#!t turning the beautiful game into a kind of 11 a side pingpong. But even this would have been bearable if the REASON for this in part would have been the teams becoming the plaything of the rich, instead of the actual fans of the game. Their interest in ONLY the bottom line filters right down to the pitch. Player values become different and you get the mechanical, mass produced armies of mercenaries demanding their pound of flesh for 90 minutes at a time. As much as I like Balotelli, if Man City wins the title this season it will bring some sadness for me because it would mean that now, football is ALL about money and you can legally buy your credentials in yet another sphere of human existence.

There isn't much to deny there, I'm afraid. It's been a few years since the pure joy of football as a sports had already departed. It's more a case now of watching billionaires play with their toys, and boasting if they win. Unfortunately, there are far too many factors at play here, probably too many to list.

Something that went on for a few hundred years, just got sucker punched in the last 10-20 years due to the greed of a few. It's not just football, pretty much most other (team) sports have also deteriorated. Sadly, we'll be the generation that last saw the pure, unadulterated, joyous football with their own eyes.

New kids growing up now don't know what they are missing - I wouldn't be surprised if they don't want to know either.