Juventus are pushing to complete a deal for Pierre Kalulu with AC Milan, a report claims, while three names have emerged as potential counterparts in the negotiation.
According to La Gazzetta dello Sport, things moved quickly yesterday as Juventus director Cristiano Giuntoli reached an agreement with both the player and the Milan CEO Giorgio Furlani. The final details are still missing, but the deal seems to be closed and the competition from Atalanta fought off.
A quick swoop
After missing out on Jean-Clair Todibo, Juve have turned to Kalulu in their bid to strengthen the defence and Giuntoli first found an agreement in principle with the player (contract worth approximately €2.5m net per season) and then one with Milan.
The Rossoneri agreed on the basis of a paid loan with an option to buy, whereby the Bianconeri would have to pay €3.5m for the loan and then €14m to make it permanent. There will be no obligation to buy, nor a conditional one upon the achievement of certain objectives.
The details regarding the bonuses (around €3m) and a future resale percentage have yet to be defined, as well as the contracts to be written, but things are well on the way. After yesterday’s telephone conversations between Giuntoli and Furlani, there will be others today.
The Frenchman arrived in Milan on a free transfer and could be a significant capital gain. Kalulu is just waiting for the green light to travel to Turin and undergo medical tests: the goal is to have him for the first match of the season, when Juventus will face Como on Monday at 20:45 at the Allianz Stadium.
Counterpart idea
There could be one of three players coming the other way, as the Juve-Milan axis has heated up. Federico Chiesa is one of them, a forward with a contract expiring in 2025 and who is out of the project at the moment.
In recent days, Chiesa was proposed to Milan, but there was no openness from the Rossoneri because of the €15m asking price and the fact that the Italian wants more than €6m net per season from his next club.
In the meantime, the name of Weston McKennie has emerged in the talks between the two clubs, another player who is not in Thiago Motta’s plans, and like Chiesa he only has one more year left on his contract. The Old Lady would like to avoid losing him for free and are trying to offload him.
Finally, Milan have given the No.9 shirt to Luke Jovic (it seems like an insurance move to confirm his stay), but if they found a striker with characteristics more suited to Paulo Fonseca’s style – like Tammy Abraham – they could still pounce.
This is why Arkadiusz Milik’s name has emerged. The Pole was absent against Atletico Madrid in Juve’s last friendly because he is not yet ready after an injury. Juve don’t want to offload him because he is the deputy to Dusan Vlahovic after Moise Kean’s sale, but a good offer could change things.
And we were getting bashed for talking to Fofana before talking to Monaco. Anyway hope this happens – Kalulu had one good half season and will be out for 3 months any day now.
Is that you Nostradamus?
That it happens frequently in football these days don’t mean it’s not frowned upon. I only know for outside the transfer window that it is the rule. Not sure about other instances.
In Juve’s case here it seems they spoke to both player and club. “Juventus director Cristiano Giuntoli reached an agreement with both the player and the Milan CEO Giorgio Furlani. ” Didn’t see where they went to Kalulu first.
The part I don’ get is why they are OK with a loan/option… If they don’t take up the option in the summer, or he doesn’t feature in enough games, then he comes back to us and we will have helped a direct rival for the entire season…
Mckennie is a name I still don’t understand why Juve bought him and I’ll be shocked and disgusted if we took him. He is overweight and c£ap. I still don’t understand how we spend all summer trying to lowball teams and haggle and then spend all of 10 seconds making up our minds and excepting lowball offers. Spent 2.5 months to get cdk and 10 months later sold for less than we bought. By the way interested to see how he develops with even more game time now that scamaccas out.
Gerry come, and management have to sell immediately, event sell cheap to direct rival.
WTF this management doing?!
Even though I like kalulu, I don’t mind selling him. But a loan with option is terrible especially to a rival. Thats gotta be an outright sale if so.
Makes you wish we got Royal on loan with option.
In my view they should keep Kalulu and sell Tomori or Thiaw.
I like kalulu but he’s not good anymore, also he’s always injured, either I would take the money, or I would take chiesa and ask for him to take a pay cut, or I would try and get djalo, someone who knows fonsesca, is good when given a proper chance unlike kalulu
I am not against Kalulu’s move, but it should be permanent. This management are doing stupid things
Yes and no. 17.5M for Kalulu plus maybe bonuses and maybe a resale clause is quite good. But Juventus probably see what many of us see: a 5th choice CB and 3rd choice RB with a history of injuries. I don’t think anyone outside of Arabia will come with a better offer. This is their way to hedge. If it turns out OK, they will trigger the clause, if not he will be returned. Then for us, if he plays well and for whatever reason Juventus doesn’t trigger the clause, it will be an advertisement for a player who will see very little time this season, meaning he’ll maintain this value or maybe increase it a little in time for summer 2025 which is when we have to sell given his contract expires in 2027.
This doesn’t make sense selling one of our players to our biggest rivals besides inter, you’ll never see man united sell one of their own to Liverpool or vice-versa or Barcelona selling to Madrid.
LOL. This happens all the time. Raheem Sterling: Liverpool > City > Chelsea. One of the biggest transfer stories of all time: Luis Figo from Barcelona to Madrid. Juventus sold Inzaghi to us. You must be relatively new to football…
Its bad day for us and good for Juve. Again Juve make us donkey.
Im disapointed and emberasing.
I would say it’s the opposite. Juventus are panic buying after wasting time on Todibo. It’s a win for us financially and Kalulu was only in like 10 games last season for us.
As usual, Milan fans want all their players to remain with the club but the want the club to keep signing players. They never want the club to sell anyone. Apart from the scudetto season, what has kalulu done for us apart from injuries upon injuries. You have your supermarket, you sell goods to buy new goods. But you don’t want the owner of a club to sell who he wants because you like the club. If you love Milan that much, send them the money to keep hold of everyone and buy anyone you like.
And the award for the most stupid comment goes to … 🥇
“The Frenchman arrived in Milan on a free transfer and could be a significant capital gain.” Is that it ? All they care is capital gain ? What about the football aspect ? We give a rival team a player that makes them better and all of that without a risk for them if the player works out or no since its an option to buy. Not to mention that Kalulu on today market is worth more then 17mil. This is such a stupid deal, but no wonder this management will pull something like this.
It’s again Gds and Tuttosport… how many times it was true, more it is rumores… acording those two we want to buy Lukaku, Hummels and others… I don’t believe everything, Yes understend the Mckennie is USA player , what is great for marketing, but really don’t need him on this positon we have better options… with Chiesa both has around 5 – 6m for a year… To many things what our management don’t want to accepted.
Next Fonseca want Salad, why we loan to Juve when we want him?
What is true is only about Kalulu, other things I don’t believe..
Kalulu is under contract until 2027.
This is the exact reason why we told Udinese hands off Bartesaghi, he should take up the role of covering both as the 5th choice CB and covering LB for Theo. This is why the Futuro is there. It’s sad that Kalulu hasn’t panned out, but a complete deal of 20.5m if fulfilled is a good deal. Especially considering he’s got 1 year left on his contract.
Kalulu is under contract until 2027.
Guy played in 11 games last season. He’s not gonna make the difference for Juventus. Panic buy for them, good business for us.
No to Milik, no to McKennie, no to selling Kalulu to Juve (specially with that formula and at that price).
Swapping Saelemaekers (who I like) for Chiesa I can get behind, because I would very much like strong Italian players in the team, bu I doubt it happens considering Chiesa’s wages.
Again guys, while not ideal, we could have a repeat of the salaemakers situation where a player comes back better and the club doesn’t activate for their reasons, or they take him fully if he plays well, and we still get our money, worst case, we get yall beloved Kalulu back after one season and make 3.5m on loan while getting his salary of the books.
Those are the options, they are not the worst in the world.
Plus Kalulu is 24, Emerson is 25, let’s stop acting like Kalulu is some project, he is an injury prone 24 year old defender who the streets won’t forget for his half season of wonder. That’s it. 20m for a player of that profile is not bad, given we paid 15m for someone who while not the best is better than him.
appart from how bad this deal would be, i dont understand why Milan is suddenly acting fast? all the negotiations took a while so far, and now that one of our opponents needs to move quickly, we are doing them the favor? why not making ridiculous first request and wasting their time? only reason i can think is to do with Chiesa – maybe in return they loan him to us and pay his salary or something like this.
It’s so bizarre watching people lose their minds over the fact that we’re going to sell a 5th choice CB and 3rd choice RB for whom we paid 500K for 17.5M.