Saelemaekers admits Maldini’s exit caused him to look for ‘another opportunity’

Alexis Saelemaekers has suggested that he would not have left AC Milan had Paolo Maldini not been sacked as the technical director this summer.

Before reading the comments below, it is worth checking out our recent Substack piece on Saelemaekers as well as Divock Origi and Charles De Ketelaere, which has some exclusive info on their respective situations prior to each leaving.

The Belgian winger was heavily linked with an exit heading into the month of August with Milan having signed three right wingers in Luka Romero, Christian Pulisic and Samuel Chukwueze. In the end he got his move to Bologna on a loan with option deal.

Saelemaekers was presented as a new Bologna player today and during his press conference he explained why he decided to leave the Rossoneri and move to Thiago Motta’s team, with his comments relayed by MilanNews.

“Before Maldini left there was no intention to go, then once some situations changed I decided to look for another opportunity in agreement with the club. I found it and I’m happy,” he said.

“I came here because I felt great trust from the coach and the club, it was important for me at this moment in my career. After good years at Milan and with the Scudetto won I wanted more minutes on the pitch and I believe that Bologna is the right choice.”

Saelemaekers was also linked with a move to Real Betis as a number of sources claimed that they opened talks.

“Yes, there was this opportunity [to move to Spain] but I felt more confidence in Bologna. I know that many were sorry about my transfer.

“Areas to improve? Let’s say I scored little, I didn’t have great attacking statistics but I’m working on it. I arrived at Milan as a full-back but Pioli decided to put me further forward.”

Tags AC Milan Alexis Saelemaekers

41 Comments

        1. “Thought people are gonna forget your clown behaviour in June?”

          The thing about Juro is… No one takes him/her seriously. And why would they? “Donkey this, donkey that. LOLOLOLOLOL.” That’s all he/she has to offer here.

          It would be fun to read all the whining from him/her from the summer. Maaan, we’d have some good laughs for sure.

    1. You forget to mention Tonali, CDK, Rebic, Origi, Gabbia, and Ballo-Toure.

      Not including Tatarusanu as his exit was planned by Maldini who made the agreement to sign Sportiello. Also not including Vranckx whom Maldini didn’t plan to redeem.

      Do I forget someone?

  1. Saelemaekers should go play for AC Maldini. No player or director is bigger than our club. NONE.

    I appreciate Maldini for his playing career but as a director he was a bit arrogant for my likeness.

    Not listening to Moncada’s recommendation and Pioli’s suggestion on players was doomed to fail. You can’t give a coach players you like or think is best. Signing CDK and Origi is a prime example of players Pioli didn’t want. Smh

    Saelemaekers wanted more playing time at Milan but Milan wanted better quality. He was a nobody before arriving at Milan.

    He should have remain humble and grateful to Pioli for turning him into a decent winger. Smh

    1. LMAO 😂😂😂
      “I appreciate Maldini for his playing career but as a director he was a bit arrogant for my likeness.

      Not listening to Moncada’s recommendation and Pioli’s suggestion on players was doomed to fail.”

      Bro, Saelemakers was a MONCADA recommendation. He listened to Moncada and bought him based on that..The logic baffles me. Pioli played him out of position just like he did with CDK…another Moncada recommendation btw smh 🤦‍♂️

      1. They think it is still funny to blame everything on Maldini. Like some brat who calls him “Paldini” like man, he was a fcn Defender. The transfer window is over, lol. Yes, it was funny for that one month, but now it is disrespectful towards him. This guy is even taking Saelemakers words out of context.

        1. whats disrespectful is people like you shiva juro and the whole gang spending the month of June and first 2 weeks of July sh*tting on Milan at every turn possible and now you think you are entitled to not being called out for being disrespectful TO THE CLUB IT SELF. Fans like you only “Respect” big names but Pioli, Gazidis, Moncada and everyone else who is not named that made the project happen doesnt matter huh?

          The massive overreaction now after 3 wins out of 3 looks even more dumb fyi.

          1. Don’t add me to that list, you c*nt. I never said anything of that sort. I think I said some sht in response to those comments, like I said this “Milan will be battling out for relegation without Tonali and Maldini” You need help if you believe anyone would be stupid enough to believe this. How messed up your life is if you are getting trig erred by stuff posted on a fcn fan site.

          2. Disrespectful to who @Pioli – oops! I mean @Boulden LOL. Nobody disrespected anyone. We all had valid questions on ownerships intent. That is allowed and should have been on minds of all true fans. Respect is given but TRUST is EARNED. Blind faith is for dogs not logical people son.
            Redbird had to earn the trust of the fans and they are slowly doing that. Each step gets better. Hope it continues. So far very positive.

            Big names?? What big names did anyone ever mention? Again more baseless assertions with zero facts. And what massive overreaction? We haven’t done anything yet. 3 games is not a season nor have we played a UCL game yet. So far I like the progress and the way the team plays but long season ahead. We shall see.

            So again more nonsense coming out of your mouth. Not surprising. So keep on with the senseless and tactless attacks @Boulden or @Pioli or whatever else you wish to change your name too. Doesn’t matter. The same foolishness will still spit from your mouth.

            Best of luck kid

          3. Juro a small correction as ive seen you mention @Pioli in some of your posts but i think the name of the commenter actually was Poli, i might be wrong though.

          4. Ah the clown appears and tries to deflect and calls his overreaction normal now and that every fan should act like him huh? Lmao

            Guess what, the season tickets that went on sale before most of the transfers happened, sold out in record times this year, so only you online fanbase overreacted, not everyone starts a stupid crusade online just because their fav player got sacked.

            Can imagine how dumb you feel now and probably now praying for Milan’s season to go wrong so you can go back to your usual complaints again huh?

            Too bad not gonna happen, we’ll reach our objectives.

          5. @Juro, This @Boulden or @Poli or whatever he is still stuck up in the past. Never got any valid arguments beside talking smack about our Greatest player. Still calls himself a fan, smh. He should support Juventus or Man United if this is the case. Talking about overhyping, did anyone here say we will win UCL? No, did anyone say we will the scudetto by December? No. This is what you call overhyping. Saying we can aim for a trophy this season is what most of us have commented on. It’s quite obvious with how our performance is. But who can tell this cu*t.

      2. You guys are not grateful to what ever somebody’s effort. Is it not P Maldini that transform the team with very smart signings ( Theo, Tonali, Bennacer, Tomori, Kjear, Ibrahimovic, Diaz, Maignan, Leo) even though there is financial restrictions on the team. Pls be grateful to others doing not to be jealous. We are thankful to his (Maldini) deed and we will remain grateful

        1. @Abdulrauf I’m assuming this was for Zion Train As I totally agree with you

          Matter of fact it was his name that was able to attract talent to come to Milan after we’ve been a laughing stock for almost a decade

    2. LOLOLOLOLO.

      Well we finally have the leader in the most uneducated devoid of all reality post competition LOL😂😂😂

      Congrats @ZionTrain. Way to come up with a completely non-factual, made up fantasy post. 🤪🤪

      This site just gets worse and worse each day

    3. CDK was Moncada’s recomendation. His agent even revealed that Moncada help the negotiation.

      “Maldini was a great supporter of Charles, but his replacement is the chief scout who helped him get his transfer through,” De Mul said.

    4. I always have thoughts like this. That Maldini is not competent enough to be Milan’s director. Bad transfer decisions and taking too long to extend the contracts of key players which resulted in those players being released for free, are some examples of his incompetence. I always felt that Maldini was too stubborn in player transfer decisions, always putting his wishes before the needs of the team . It is very clear that Milan’s transfer policy last season was not what Pioli wanted, and not based on the needs of the team. It can be seen from the many players brought in by Maldini last season, only Thiaw is still in the team. So, yes, the decision to fire Maldini was a necessary one. As a milan fan, i have great respect for him as milan’s greatest legend, but the interests of the club must come first

      1. You think he is not competent because you expect him to fill role that he didn’t hold. His role is only dealing with transfer/contract, not scouting, analyzing the team, or structuring the finance.

        Maldini is not scout, Moncada scouted for him. Pioli ask Maldini for players to fill certain role, Maldini ask Moncada who are the players who can fill that role and he negotiate to sign the target, that’s how he operated. Maldini is not the one who identify what the team needs, that’s Pioli’s role. Maldini is not the one who identify the players to sign, that’s Moncada’s role. Maldini is not competent in identifying the team’s needs and identifying the players to sign but that weren’t his role.

        Maldini also do not hold financial key, it was Furlani and Gazidis who hold it. Maldini was restricted, he also work in covid era where other clubs lack transfer fund so it is harder to sell players.

        The only huge upside that Maldini has is he can attract players to Milan even when Milan was in bad period. Now Milan is in good period, players got attracted to Milan even without him, so Maldini is no longer needed (that was the reason of his sacking according to Scaloni).

        1. People often forget Maldini’s role was often limited to the budget given to him and the wage caps imposed by Furlani..he couldn’t negotiate beyond a certain point. It’s because he was the Sporting director, key point Sporting, that his concerns were on the sporting side and the results from that department which is what he did and achieved (Scudetto, UCL semi). He did what his role asked of him.
          Funny enough I like that the current management is spending the money he helped accumulate in the UCL showing last year based on his approach and selling a player he was instrumental in signing. But that never gets mentioned

      2. “I always felt that Maldini was too stubborn in player transfer decisions, always putting his wishes before the needs of the team”

        I want to genuinely know how you came up with this conclusion. Is it your gut feeling or is it from what you read? Like what is the basis for thinking Maldini was putting his wishes before the team needs. Just keeping in mind you know that problem we have in defence, well guess who wanted a defender when everyone else said we didn’t. Anyways…happy to hear

  2. here goes the neighborhood …

    Best of wishes to him and hope he will silence some of the people around here if that is in fact even a possibility.

  3. Right, it was Maldini leaving…not the fact that we upgraded the position and there was no spot for you anymore and the team was actively trying to sell you.

  4. I see the same crap over and over again from people that are sitting in trenches on the opposite side and that are cheering for the same club. I will admit that I overreacted when Maldini was sucked so what….the game of football is so beautiful because there is an emotion to the game and for us that grew up in the 90s Maldini was Milan and still is Milan. I see people bashing on him as a director as well when on the sporting side, as soon as Maldini came back to Milan the club started to recover from the the banter era and culminated with the title wining campaign. There was a legitimacy to the project injected with the appointment of Maldini. I’m not disrespecting anyone from the team work that was done from the management as a whole to bring back Milan to the right track but no one compares to Maldini in terms of gravity in the world of football… especially for this club. The new management did some good work this summer but that doesn’t exuse Cardinale on how he concluded the divorce with Maldini. One sentence on the website….really ? This club was always class, I get that Cardinale bought and owns the club but he will need to get better at trying to improve the club as a whole but respect the tradition and class that this club has always shown otherwise whats the point. I think I got most of it off my chest Forza Milan and stop u guys with the toxicity!

    1. Maldini is not scout, Moncada scouted for him. Pioli ask Maldini for players to fill certain role, Maldini ask Moncada who are the players who can fill that role and he negotiate to sign the target, that’s how he operated. Maldini is not the one who identify what the team needs, that’s Pioli’s role. Maldini is not the one who identify the players to sign, that’s Moncada’s role. Maldini is not competent in identifying the team’s needs and identifying the players to sign but that weren’t his role.

      Maldini also do not hold financial key, it was Furlani and Gazidis who hold it. Maldini was restricted, he also work in covid era where other clubs lack transfer fund so it is harder to sell players.

      The only huge upside that Maldini has is he can attract players to Milan even when Milan was in bad period. Now Milan is in good period, players got attracted to Milan even without him, so Maldini is no longer needed (that was the reason of his sacking according to Scaloni).

  5. “Before Maldini left there was no intention to go, then once some situations changed I decided to look for another opportunity in agreement with the club. I found it and I’m happy.”

    Amazing how people in the comments can find a way to argue and put someone down over such an innocent statement by Saelemaekers.

  6. If salad dont leave , ACM wont get pulisic and samuel chukwu . Salad want more play time while his scoring ability or atacking stat are low. 2 goal in serie A every season too low for winger

    1. He was a right back though as he himself said. Maybe he wasn’t good enough to be a right back or a RW…..maybe RWB?? I dunno 🤷‍♂️

    2. “If salad dont leave , ACM wont get pulisic and samuel chukwu”

      AC Milan already get Pulisic and Chuk before Saelemaekers leave. It is their arrival that pushed him out, not his departure that brought them.

  7. Wow this got out of hand….

    Sad to see you go 19’er. You’re a legend. Let’s see if your replacements can become legends too.

    Do they have it in them to be 20’ers?

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