France boss Didier Deschamps has caused a stir with some comments he made regarding the trip to Australia that both AC Milan and Roma went on last week.
In the unsolvable battle that has always and will always pit the needs of the clubs against those of the national teams, Deschamps did not mince words to describe his discontent towards Milan: “Organising a tour in Australia in the midst of the national team’s retreat, it’s not very nice.”
As La Gazzetta dello Sport write, the reference is obviously to the friendly played on Friday against Roma in Perth, which saw Milan leave for Australia on Monday last week, to return to Italy on Saturday.
In addition to that, it is also obvious that Deschamps is not interested in the rest of the Milan squad, just Theo Hernandez and Olivier Giroud. Not even Mike Maignan was impacted, who was injured and did not take part in the intercontinental trip.
The France coach is already annoyed by increasingly busy calendars which progressively shorten the national team retreats and he has pointed a finger at the Australia trip since the announcement of the list of players called up for the European Championship.
We were still in mid-May when DD had already revealed a certain discontent, cutting short those who asked him if Giroud and Theo would be available for the first friendly against Luxembourg, scheduled for 5 June in Metz.
“They don’t play because they travel. Five days away, 24 hours of travel on the outward journey, 24 on the return journey,” he said.
“But it’s also a question of FIFA dates which opens its cycle on 3 June, so the Milanese management have every right to do so, but I won’t hide from you that there is little chance that the Rossoneri players will be included in the plans for our first match.”
Milan obviously believe that they has done everything legitimately, based on their own sporting needs, but above all of a commercial nature. The week in Australia culminating with the match against Roma (a 5-2 defeat) was in fact organised to help boost brand visibility and connect with fans down under.
There was a significant participation fee for both clubs as part of an event that saw the involvement of the Government of Western Australia, a country where Milan – according to the data in the club’s possession – has a fan base which exceeds two million people, with several fan clubs.
Furthermore, as happens in these types of occasion, both clubs were contractually required to have a minimum participation of first-tier players – four – to give meaning to the match and the long trip.
Here, however, the philosophies went in slightly different directions: Milan, by their own choice, brought the majority of the squad (Maignan was absent, plus Rafael Leao and Christian Pulisic for personal reasons), while Roma opted to leave at home the national team players at home.