Throughout this season, we have regularly been able to get a grasp on the mercatos that AC Milan had. However, with European football now looking unlikely, we can view it in a more complete sense.
With Milan having aspirations of a title battle this season, the summer mercato was seen as quite underwhelming. Then, with the season looking like a failure, the management attempted to salvage things in January.
However, it has not proved successful.
Today, Milan News have taken a look at the signings made this year, and with the club signing ‘practically a new team’, there are several negatives to speak about.
It is unfair to suggest that players cannot salvage things a little between now and the end of the season, but the report states that assessments and reflections can already start being made, after all, the club already have, as seen in January.
Youssouf Fofana’s quality is there for all to see, Tammy Abraham has not ‘objectively disappointed’ and Kyle Walker is as good as his team is.
Then, the less positive reflections. Strahinja Pavlovic is too inconsistent, Joao Felix and Emerson Royal have been branded ‘disastrous’. Alvaro Morata also follows this, departing after just six months.
Santiago Gimenez started well, but has trailed off in the past two months, then Riccardo Sottil and Warren Bondo have not been given enough opportunities to fully impress.
Do they have the time to, though?
1-The signings have been random, making it hard for players and coaches to find a system that works. One injury or substitution forces a formation change or players out of position.
2-The management deserves more scrutiny for the Pavlovic, Walker, and Emerson signings considering how unnecessary they were and how they failed to improve the team. We already had Kalulu, Simic, Jiminez and Calabria.
3-We needed midfielders, after losing Tonali, De Ketelaare, Diaz, Krunic, and Bennacer (injury) and their replacements failing to impress, the entire team fell apart. Luckily, Reijnders improved a lot this season so we may only need two new midfielders.
Walker was absolutely necessary. He’s no great fb anymore but offers more than Calabria and at the time he was signed Milan didn’t have a healthy rb
I know Calabria has fitness issues but he had been in the squad on the bench since November and he seems to be playing well enough at Bologna. Plus we had Jimenez. For me, it’s an issue of priority. We currently have one midfielder we can rely on in Reijnders. That’s insane! Fofana deserves the benefit of the doubt considering the chaos in the club, but this is the area of the squad that needs the most attention. Instead of addressing existing holes in the squad, this management is creating new ones and failing to fix them.
Sadly, not much will change with the current people in charge. Competent people need to take over.
Our mercato the last two seasons have been disastrous. So many players coming in with quantity over quality. Our midfield is the worst amongst the top 9 teams in serie a. If I was in Cardinale’s shoes, I would fire Moncada and bring in a sporting director with a tactical knowledge on how to build a team.
Sell Leao and use the money to buy a quality LW replacement, and a quality Kessie-esque CDM. The rest of the team will fall into place around that. The quality CDM is what gives the entire team confidence. We lost it when Kessie left.
22 players and 250 millions spent in 2.5 seasons to sit in the middle of the table.
3 out of 22 players turned out to be something worthy of a mention.
Now we’re in for another summer of selling one or couple or most of our prized players so that Moncada can waste more money on cheap, foreign imports like Chukwuemeka, Badiashile and Mosquera.