Mercato

GdS: Fonseca’s announcement confirmed – Saelemaekers will remain at Milan

By Oliver Fisher -

AC Milan head coach Paulo Fonseca surprised some when he spoke so highly of Alexis Saelemaekers following a couple of good friendly performances, and now he looks more likely to stay.

Saelemaekers was one of the best on the pitch in the match against Rapid Wien and he kept those positive signs going against Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City, getting an assist and creating plenty with his dribbles.

As La Gazzetta dello Sport (seen below) recall, the Belgian first seemed destined to be permanently signed by Bologna who had an option to buy, and then when he returned to Milanello the feeling was that he would be sold to another club.

However, now he ‘will not leave’ and this was confirmed by Fonseca himself, impressed not only by the assist for Marco Nasti’s 3-2 goal on Saturday evening, but more generally by how Alexis is working in this pre-season.

“He’s a player I really like because he has quality. Every coach would like to train a player who can be used in different positions. He is more confident than in the past and I would like to keep him in the team,” he said.

Based on what the paper are implying, any desire by the management to sell him to raise cash has been overruled by Fonseca, who wishes to keep him and use him.

Tags AC Milan Alexis Saelemaekers

42 Comments

  1. I don’t mind that and respect fonsecas decision. Saelemaekers isnt ever going to be a star, but if he’s fine with a bench role he comes on and gives his all and can play in different positions. I can definitely see pulisic going into the attacking mid role with fonseca putting full trust in chukwueze and saelemaekers as his sub

        1. “A” back to Leao not the only or even the main backup.
          Furthemore Pulisic can either play as an AM (it seems that there is an idea in that direction) or remain as the main RW.
          Okafor can also play as a striker.
          But if they can make him work as a RB, why not.

          1. But why? Why are you repositioning other players to fit Salad in?
            LW – Leao Okafor.
            RW – Chuk Puli
            CAM – Puli/RLC/Reijnders/Samardzic even…

            Salad will never be a winger. I don’t get the attachment. Stay on a bench and learn a new BACK UP position in hopes of playing a handful of times a season?

            As opposed to sell off, bring money in towards another signing of need AND Salad can play regularly elsewhere…

          2. @ACM1899:
            Look I don’t care that much about Saelemakers and I’m not gonna try again to get him to fit somewhere, but it does seem that coach liked what he saw from him and for me that’s enough good reason to keep the player (unless somehow a massive offer comes for him which I doubt).
            Now, you could say that he has yet to see Okafor, Leao and Pulisic and that, should he have seen them sooner, maybe he wouldn’t even have noticed Saelemakers.
            But look at it this way, many of us (including me) complained that Fonseca would be a “yes man” that won’t make requests and just accept whatever the management would give him, and yet here he is making requests, and you want to deny him that ? How can he work like he wants, or be judged properly if we’re gonna deny him that ?
            Is keeping Saelemakers a mistake ? Perhaps, but its the coach’s mistake to make. Should he fail, it will tell us a lot about Fonseca from the get-go, and should he succeed, well, good for us, right ?

          3. I get that. But Alexis isn’t a critical position for us. Whereas the money he would bring in could make a difference in bringing another vital piece in.

            That’s my position.

          4. Can someone please tell me where Puli played any sustained number of games as an AM?

            @ACM1899 …
            Puli natural spot was LW but he is two footed. He was excellent his first year as a RW for us. He also demonstrated what an all action winger can do on defense and transition.

            Salamaekers is Puli-light. Same game same energy. While not two footed he can play both RW and LW.

            The notion only he can be sold for funds to buy is limited. Maybe the question is if Salad is staying, who goes on the sell list?

            Ok4 – his lack of any game time in the Euros was ominous.
            Chuk – he was expensive liability most of last year. Could we get $30 for him?
            Thiaw – at $41m is it surplus enough to hold on to Salad as a “free”

        1. Well I’m just assuming, since Saele was used as a left winger.
          In any case, I don’t really care much about Saelemakers, but if the coach wants to keep him, he should be allowed to make this decision (or mistake ?). Although I think he should first observe Leao and Okafor before making a final decision.

  3. Question is how they gonna fit them all if Fonseca wants to keep Saelemaekers and sign Samardzic?

    Okafor moves up as third striker?

    LWF: Leao and Saelemaekers
    AMF: R-L-C and Samardzic
    RWF: Pulisic and Chuckwueze
    FW: Morata, Jovic, Okafor?

    Adli or Pobega (one will most likely be sold), Bennacer, Reijnders and whoever we sign: Fofana or Koné in the double pivot?

    1. My guess would be since Bennacer and Reijnders can both play as CAM, to make space for Saelemakers Pulisic will need to play time-to-time on CAM. We don’t need any more CAMs, double-pivot is the issue.

      We need to upgrade both Pobega and Adli. We need CDM-like players, strong defensive ones.

  4. Hmmm… But all the people on this site kept saying Fonseca is a “yes man” and does aaaaaanything the management tells him to. And now he’s telling the management to NOT sell the guy and they’re not selling? I wonder though… Who is right, the know-it-all fans here or the media? Exciting times, eh? 😀

    1. Exactly. Some fans will always be negative. no matter what happens they will always find something negative and toxic to say.

    2. This.
      This is why despite me not having much of an opinion about Saelemakers (or Colombo for that matters), I will support keeping them if that’s what the coach wants.
      I wasn’t for Fonseca, but since he is the new appointed coach, he should be allowed to make decisions about whom we wants to work with and of course be judged on that during the course of the season.

      1. I’m just glad we have ANYONE else but Pioli as the coach. Every opponent knew months before how Milan was going to play against them and everything was so darn predictable as Pioli was stubborn as a mule.

        So, needless to say I was happy Fonseca joined and brought something new to the table. And based on the passing play against ManCity it looks like we’ve already passing the ball 10000x faster and better than during the last 3 years. I’m already satisfied with his work. 😀 😀 😀

        2. I will be careful about the “ANYONE”, we could have gotten another Giampaolo for what we know. I would still have prefered Motta or even Conceição to Fonseca, but regardless of whom we got, we should allow him to make the decisions regarding whom he wants to work with, otherwise one can claim that his tenure was “sabotaged” by a non-cooperative management.
          I don’t know about the Man City game, it’s just a friendly, but I hope that what we saw there isn’t just a fluke.

          1. At least the passes Milan players gave to each others were from a different planet compared to last 3 years. So quick and powerful. That has been missing for ages. It has felt like every new player was commanded to slow down their passes immediately when they joined the team. Not anymore. 🙂

  5. He might end up taking someone’s spot and be a starter 😁 nice headache to have though 👌 said it earlier in the summer…just keep him as backup to Leao and Puli/Chuk both

  6. So i was right when i said that Okafor is a waste of money since we could have only switched Salamakers on the LW as a back up.

        1. Saelemaekers needs his head when playing against a determined Bologna, Torino, and the league’s big guns – Inter, Juventus, Napoli, Lazio, as well as in the Champions league. He did well against Man City’s young boys, but, can he sustain that performance the whole season. If he was that good, Bologna would have signed him, or Juventus would have been pestering us for him. For me, he’s a decent player, but, not Milan standard moving forward. However, if the coach wants him, that’s his luck. I only hope he will not end up disappointing him, as Krunic did Pioli, despite calls to sell him when there was a good offer for him. If he doesn’t do well this season, we will struggle to sell him.

      2. The problem is that he was brought as a LW back up, as a CF we had Jovic/Colombo. Not saying that he is bad squad player, its just that we didnt need him and wasted 15 mil which could have been spent on other positions.

    2. Everyone (well, almost) thought Okafor would fill our CF post when we signed him after that Taremi fiasco. And then suddenly Pioli said he’s not a CF (another confusion link up between him and the management) that’s why we signed another CF in Jovic on the last day.

      And we should thanks Motta and Bologna who ‘unlocked’ his potential on LW.

    3. Okafor, even with his limited playing time, has 6 goals and 2 assists. More than Saelamaekers ever has had in a season. Don’t stretch the truth.

      1. You’re right, mate. We shouldn’t get carried away with the showing in preseason, where most clubs are using their second string and young boys, with so many first team players still resting after euro 2024. Okafor is not a central striker. Moving him to that position, and using Saelemaekers as replacement for Leao, without getting another central striker, simply means we would be relying on Morata, with Okafor and Jovic as backups. That’s a big gamble. If there’s space for him that won’t affect getting another striker, no problem.

  8. I’m happy for him. Here’s a crazy thought – how about we use Salad as a backup left or right wing for Leao or Chuk, move Pulisic into the middle, forget Fulkrug and stick Okafor up front to alternate with Morata? That’d save us some greenbacks which we could then put toward Fofana while trying to offload Thiaw to Newcastle so we can afford a decent RB instead of Royal.

    1. Okafor needs space to run into to be effective. He’s a winger by nature. Haven’t we experimented enough last season to see what he can and can not do?

      Him and Jovic only work as the “kitchen sink” approach in the box.

      I don’t understand the need to keep 56.

      1. I don’t understand either, but the coach asked for that (although you could say that he didn’t see Okafor or Leao for that matters), so we should allow him that decision (or mistake).

      2. Okafor’s “natural position” is a CF – at least that’s where he’s more effective than on the wing in my book. Although he’s pretty good there too. I don’t know, I’ve always thought of Salad as a diamond in the rough and the spell in Bologna seems to have done his game the world of good – a bit like Gabbia.

    2. I mean on the paper, leao puli chuk behind either morata/okafor seems terrifying.
      Puli has also showed that he has the work ethic to help the defense.
      Sadly pioli was to stubborn to try this, even during the end of last season when chuk found his form, and milan already guaranteed cl spot

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