The make up of AC Milan’s squad has moved from being less Italian to more global since the departure of Silvio Berlusconi, a report has highlighted.
As Calciomercato.com notes, just five years ago in the 2014-15 campaign there were 18 Italian players in the Rossoneri squad, as well as the following year.
Then it moved to 15 in 2016-17, the same in 2017-18 and 12 last year. If in the 2006 World Cup squad there were five Milan stars called up, in recent years only Donnarumma and Romagnoli have frequently made the Azzurri squads.
The situation actually looks set to continue along that trend. Bonaventura has already said goodbye, Calabria could follow him with teams in Spain interested, and the targets such as Dumfries, Aurier, Milenkovic, Ajer, Florentino and Bakayoko all come from abroad.
Yes there are also rumours about the returns of Pessina and of Pobega, but Milan’s DNA is undoubtedly increasingly international.
Below is a list of the Italians in the Milan squad over the last five seasons…
2014-15: Agazzi, De Sciglio, Saponara, Bonaventura, El Shaarawy, Destro, Pazzini, Albertazzi, Paletta, Poli, Montolivo, Bocchetti, Antonelli, Abate, Cerci, Bonera, Zaccardo, Abbiati
2015-16: De Sciglio, Cerci, Romagnoli, Bertolacci, Poli, Montolivo, Abate, Matri, Calabria, Nocerino, Bonaventura, Paletta, Antonelli, Donnarumma, Abbiati, Balotelli, Locatelli, Zaccardo.
2016-17: De Sciglio, Bonaventura, Lapadula, Romagnoli, Poli, Montolivo, Abate, Storari, Antonelli, Plizzari, Cutrone, Locatelli, Bertolacci, Calabria, G. Donnarumma.
2017-18: Calabria, Bonaventura, Borini, Conti, Romagnoli, Montolivo, Bonucci, Abate, Paletta, Storari, Antonelli, Cutrone, Locatelli, A. Donnarumma, G. Donnarumma.
2018-19: Calabria, Bonaventura, Borini, Conti, Romagnoli, Bertolacci , Abate, Caldara, Plizzari, Cutrone, A. Donnarumma, G. Donnarumma.
2019-20: Calabria, Bonaventura, Conti, Romagnoli, Gabbia, A. Donnarumma, G. Donnarumma.
For the short term its ok but in the long term i deffently prefer us to buy more italians than bringing in players from abroad. Milan is an italian club and therefore should have the vast ammount of its players comming from the italian peninsula. It adds to squad coherency and it also strengthen the italian international team and thereby also the club and league. Unfortunately italian players are often priced far higher compared to bringing in foreigners of equal level of talent so for the time being it makes sense untill we get back in a stronger financial position where we can be more picky than currently. In the long run i think we should strive to have atleast 2/3 of our players being italian but that is propably a some years away before that is an option atleast if we want to have quality players.