AC Milan have had a very busy start to the summer but one of the positions they must fill is the role of deputy left-back, a report claims.
According to La Gazzetta dello Sport, Fode Ballo-Touré will soon leave and an agreement with Fulham is not far away, meaning that a new back-up to Theo Hernandez is needed in the last five weeks of the window.
Riccardo Calafiori of Basel is a candidate, however he doesn’t convince everyone at Milan in terms of his characteristics, despite the fact he would tick a box when it comes to the squad lists.
Speaking of which, the composition of the squad is making the management lean towards signing an Italian left-back. UEFA ask for a list of 25 players, with four academy products for that club and another four having come through academies in that country.
Milan only have Davide Calabria, Tommaso Pobega and Lorenzo Colombo as Primavera graduates given Matteo Gabbia is heading for Villarreal. Marco Sportiello, Antonio Mirante and Alessandro Florenzi are the three home-grown players.
At the moment Milan can register 23 players, not 25. For this reason, the club is looking for a player who came through a youth sector in Italy for the role of deputy left-back. However, Italian-trained left-backs are not abundant.
Juventus have asked for €20m for Andrea Cambiaso, too much for Milan, while Luca Pellegrini earns too much in terms of salary to be a deputy. Cristiano Biraghi, who has already worked under Pioli, has just renewed with Fiorentina and Fabiani Parisi has joined him there.
Calafiori is a candidate, with his 34 games (including cups) in the last season at Basel. In pre-eason, while waiting for Theo to return, Florenzi is playing on the left side and this could also be an idea: to transfer him to the left and buy a new Italian-trained deputy to Davide Calabria.
I guess Singo qualifies as a home grown because he was with Torino for 3 years between the ages of 15 and 21
He doesn’t have an Italian passport but according to his stay in youth he will not be counted as a non European player. It is differ
The non-Eu rule counts only if the player is joining from abroad, if the player were to play in Serie A and transferred to Milan he wouldn’t count as non-Eu.
The question here is if florenzi will be able to play.. He is in and out of the injured list a lot. If something happens to Theo and Florenzi is already out that would be a major handicap.
Juventus want 20 mil… Whoever we get let’s just steer clear of Juventus players after the raving successes of Caldara Bonucci Higuain etc.
Yes, that’s an option. Also Calabria, and Kalulu to the less extent can also play as left back.
that’s why Singo idea emerge… Too bad Augello already join Cagliari for 2m. That’s possibly a cheap alternative but oh well.
Why not try Antonio Gallo from Lecce? Or even Mazocchi… Italian, Experienced and can play in both wing.
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If replacements cost 15 to 20 million, just meep Touré, how dumb are they? Creating problems that don’t exist. For what Ballo cost us, we won’t find a much better player right now.
I don’t know why Maldini decided to outrightly sell Kerkez, this would have not been an issue right now.
I think it’s safe for us to assume he wasn’t a good LEFT-BACK if MALDINI of all people didn’t value him.
Or maybe Maldini was just bad at his job.
Kerkez just transferred to Bournemouth for 18 mil after Moncada found him for 200k and Maldini sold him for 1 million.
Just because Maldini was a left back doesn’t mean that he knows how to evaluate talent.
Michael Jordan is the best player to ever bounce a basketball and in more than 15 years he couldn’t draft one good player.
Kerkez is another of Maldini’s bad moves as a Milan technical director. He couldn’t even insert a resale percentage in Kerkez deal. Even Mirabelli had the brains to insert that in Pessina sale to Atalanta. I think Milan will get 50% this summer of the 12 mil Monza paid Atalanta for Pessina after they activated his buyout clause
No doubt that maldini was no where near as good behind the scenes for Milan as he was on the field but if it’s fair for me to say just because Bournemouth decided to pay the almost 20 m kerkez and his agent valued him at doesn’t mean it’s a good decision by them, they also signed Romain Faivre, a player they also back out on as did lyon. Not even benfica thought kerkez was worth as much as he is currently valued at, I’ll give him credit for being determined an eager to prove himself but I think it was his impatience that forced him to play in holland, and the premier league is a huge jump so we’ll see time will tell, at least he’s in a team that’s as developmentally sound as Bournemouth, we kid live to regret it or maybe we’ll see that they knew what they were doing and were right to wait on him, remember it was his choice to leave, he wasn’t forced out.
It was both Maldini and Pioli’s fault.
I remember Maldini wanted to send him on loan because they signed Ballo Toure as backup to Leao.
A coach who is good at his job would have simply blocked the Ballo transfer and promoted Kerkez as Theo’s backup.
Similarly, a Director who is good at his craft would have recommended Kerkez to the coach rather than spending, as Kerkez was already clearly better than Ballo.
This is another error by both coach and management.
“At the moment Milan can register 23 players, not 25.”
Well… Isn’t it already more than they had last season? Not a big deal having 1 or 2 more players on the list if they stay fit. Oh right, everyone Milan buys is “injury prone” based on the super-scouts. 😀
Then sign Calafiori? I don’t know what else we can do in this regard
Valeri from Cremonense is a decent and cheap option for Italian LB.
Caldara can be the fifth choice DC, replacing Gabbia. He is considered a national-trained player
Lastly, is Romero considered as national-trained? He already spent two seasons at Lazio before turning 21 years old
Bring De Sciglio back. He is injured for now and be back in October but he would be the perfect deputy to Theo. The other good point is that he can play LB or RB, knowing that Florenzi is often injured, it makes sense for me.