AC Milan are on the hunt for a new midfielder who can become the deputy to Youssouf Fofana, and a report has claimed that there are two ideas above all.
According to today’s edition of Corriere dello Sport (via MilanNews), the difficult beginning to the season has exposed some gaps in the Milan squad and one of them is that fact that there is no reliable back-up for Fofana.
As early as the January window, Geoffrey Moncada and co. could decide to accelerate and sign a midfielder with more defensive characteristics with two names standing out: Johnny Cardoso of Real Betis and Samuele Ricci of Torino.
Cardoso had already ended up in the sights of the Diavolo’s directors in the summer when the arrival of Fofana from Monaco did not seem so certain. He has US and Italian citizenship and could therefore be registered as an EU citizen (Milan have no free slots for non-EU players), with the asking price around €20m.
Ricci meanwhile is certainly a slightly more complicated idea than the one that leads to Cardoso, first of all because it has a higher cost (at least €30m), then the fact Torino are unlikely to sell a star in January, while Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City are also interested.