AC Milan director Igli Tare wanted to sign Mateo Retegui in the summer, but could not rival the bid that came in from the Middle East.
Milan were linked with a long list of strikers during the most recent summer window. Some never seemed close to joining like Dusan Vlahovic and Moise Kean, while others came a lot closer like Victor Boniface and Conrad Harder.
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In the end, no natural centre-forward arrived. The big investment was made to sign Christopher Nkunku from Chelsea for €37m plus bonuses, a player who is more of a wild card given the various roles he can fill.
‘Tare made several enquiries’
Fabrizio Romano spoke in a YouTube video on his channel and gave some interesting background about Milan’s attempts to land Retegui, which ultimately fell short financially.
“In June, Igli Tare made several inquiries about bringing Mateo Retegui to Milan, but at different prices, the Rossoneri would never have paid €66-70m,” he stated.
“We were talking about different figures, around €35-40m with bonuses. Atalanta never opened up and waited for Saudi Arabia. Milan, however, had some thoughts about it.
“Retegui isn’t considering a January departure from Al-Qadisiya. The striker will still consider Serie A in the future, I can assure you. The meeting with Milan didn’t work out for several reasons.”
Atalanta don’t sell to competitors for 35-40mil. Look at how much they sold Koop for. Besides, outside of Retegui, most of the Atalanta ex-Gasp crop fail elsewhere.
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Simple math actually, Atalanta just know that their stars are worth more, Inter wanted Lookman and Atalanta wanted 50mill which was actually a discount the way the markets going, if Cunha and mbuemo can go for 70mill plus Lookman could have went for 60-65 mill, they play in a better league but I don’t think they’re better players than Lookman. Retegui is not worth 60mill but English and Saudi have money to burn, you can’t blame them for getting as much as possible for him like we did with Thiaw.
I spoken for several time, if Milan want buil a team, Milan must have playing system, playing philosopy, and recruitment system, all of it must applicate for all player segmen U 10, U 12, U 15, U 16, U 17 until senior team must have same role, and they must have commitment, old player like modric, rabiot just a duplicator for young player, if they resign the young can take offer their place. And youngster need more playing time too get their performance like senior (old player). Learn from the past like Albertini to Pirlo, Maldini to Nesta, Nesta to Silva. And don’t waste young potential player like CDK, etc they become good player after out from Milan.