AC Milan president Paolo Scaroni has admitted that Stefano Pioli is now more involved in the decisions regarding transfer business.
With Paolo Maldini and Ricky Massara having been sacked as the technical and sporting director, multiple sources have suggested that transfer dealings should be a bit more streamlined and should crucially afford Pioli a bit more say in the decision-making process.
Pioli must highlight the holes in his squad and the types of players that will be most compatible with his system, with Geoffrey Moncada suggesting profiles and Giorgio Furlani having the final say as the CEO.
Scaroni spoke to Rai Sport during the ‘Joyride the Future’ event put on last night by Milan and BMW Italia to celebrate the renewal of the automotive brand as a principal partner, with his comments relayed by MilanNews.
“One signing a week is not a small amount, there are six weeks to go. We still have some things to do and we will do to build a strong Milan that can do well in the Champions League,” he said,
“Milan’s number one goal is to always be in the Champions League, it is a fundamental ingredient of our strategy, then anything that comes in addition is welcome of course, but it’s not as essential as being in the Champions League.”
How does Pioli seem to you?
“I think the coach is happy and satisfied. I saw him on Monday at Milanello and he seemed satisfied and happy. We work in perfect harmony between the coach, the technical area and Furlani. Everything proceeds in harmony, we believe a lot in this Milan style.”
Has Pioli’s role changed?
“He’s very involved in the decisions that are made and this is positive. Milan have 500 million fans around the world, they want to see us in the Champions League and it’s important for us to be there. We want to feed these fans with our successes.”
Christian Pulisic has arrived…
“It’s positive. We will leave for an American tour. Milan are the number 1 team for fans in the USA.”
Well yeah he should have more say. Thats a given. This is his team he’s coaching. And he knows what he needs to do better.
Hahaha it’s worse every time he opens his mouth. 500M fans in a world counting 8 billions people, where did they found this number that’s ridiculous.
At least he’s honest about the ambitions, being 4th in Serie A every year will be enough for this ownership, as long as the brand grows in the US.
There’s that word again… “yes men”, sorry I meant harmony . “We work in perfect harmony between the coach, the technical area and Furlani”. So anytime you see a signing and wonder where it came from and what would be the use, just remember…perfect harmony lol 😂
I gotta say the little jabs at M&M are quite humorous
Haha “Pioli we are buying this guy, he’s American and cheap, maybe he’s good, maybe not. Thank you for your cooperation.”
So we heard a lot that Serie A is a weak market and teams don’t have money, so of course Milan can’t compete with big European clubs from England or Spain or PSG, Bayern. But it seems like we won’t even compete with the weak Italian teams for the domestic title because we just focus on UCL qualifications, and “anything that comes in addition is welcome”. Thanks for the clarification Scaroni, it ends a long and rough debate on the comment section.
Funny how no one had an issue when Pioli was Maldini yes man. When Pioli didn’t demand any players or when he didn’t raise hell while M&M were losing his most important players for free and weren’t replacing them.
People had no problem then with Pioli, the yes man, but now it’s an issue because he isn’t Maldini’s yes man anymore
These guys are just bashing on the new management. They do that all the time. Meanwhile this team is actually reinforcing correctly. I was a bit pessimistic too. But it’s reality now.
Man what bothers me is that you are so mad because we don’t share your opinion or because we bash the new management. Are you close to them, or siblings? For now the debate is polarized, nobody is right or wrong until the team plays and until we can draw conclusions in one year. Now we are free to express our disagreement with the new strategy that is clearly explained by Scaroni here, and we are free to think that the guys we are recruiting are just gambles or average players. Relax and let’s see.
We’ll see when they play. I mean they brought in 2 injury risk players from Chelsea, Reijnders who needs to prove himself in a real league now and we’ll see who the striker and winger signed are. Doesn’t look like real reinforcing too me but we’ll see when they play. They are literally buying players they can get for 20M. If you didn’t notice that is the plan. Buy 20M players.
My friend you’re just giving your imagination free rein and warming your blood for nothing. We’re just commenting what Scaroni said.
And I didn’t speak about Pulisic, there is clearly an inclination to recruit US players and Scaroni also said why.
This isn’t about the relationship between Pioli and the directors. This is about the relationship between the ownership and the directors. Ownership kept all the yes ppl and let go all the people who said anything contrarian. did u not notice this? And isn’t that indicative of Scaroni’s words? Why do u think he says there’s now perfect harmony? Because to him, Maldini created an unharmonius atmosphere. It’s all now perfect (he said the same think right after the sacking). That’s also not a good way to run an organization, you always need a dissenting voices, granted if that voice becomes too disruptive then it’s best to let it go which I believe is what they did with Maldini and then Massara followed because he felt responsible also. But who am I to tell ppl how to run their business. I just find it funny the jabs that’s all
Also, to ur point ppl here were also complaining that Pioli needed to speak up in the past. Seems like he’s kinda finally doing so to a degree with his presser the other day🙂
Or maybe just maybe Maldini thought he was the smartest man in the room. Didn’t he spend a whole month negotiating his own renewal demanding full autonomy?
Also, you can have difference in opinion behind close doors, not to call out for investments on TV. That’s a bad look for the club and wouldn’t be tolerated at any place of work. At the end of the day Maldini was Cardinale’s employee and his subordinate.
Maldini thought he was too big to get fired. Well he was wrong.
I did not like that he called them out in public either but I think looking back at it I sort of see why he did it and I eluded to it in another post. He spoke as a man who knew the writing was on the wall. And it was probably his only or own way of communicating to the public the differences in approach and ideas. He strongly felt his way was better given he was a player with success and that he seemed to have being growing in his role and influence as a director. He overestimated that and underestimated Gerry’s trigger finger (in Europe they handle these things differently). The whole Dybala thing was also in line with that. There was no need to even go there but I think it was what he was expressing the frustration he had to deal with at the time (ie do they want a youth project or not, and if not then buy actually good players)
I think his legend may have gotten to him and his influence. Exceptional players have massive egos and I’m sure he’s the same. Just like Ibra. But I love them. It’s what creates the highest level of a player. That being said, it’s hard to follow Milan for 30+ years and not root for him. It’s impossible..hence
It is very simple. Milan fans supported Maldini because he did whatever he could to convince Elliot and Red Bird to reinforce the team without selling the best players. Maldini was sacked for that reason so he deserves Milan fans to respect him. Pioli did not accept to play 433 last year (he had the players for that) but he insisted with 4231 and he needed to see 5 Inter midfielders humiliate poor Tonali & Bennacer in the CL to understand that we need to play with 433.
“Pioli we are buying this guy, he’s American and cheap, maybe he’s good, maybe not. Thank you for your cooperation”
I assume you speak about Pulisic. His injury history is questionable but him being a good player is not. This dude was the reason Chelsea beat R Madrid in the semi final of the UCL just couple years ago. And none of the Chelsea players had good season last year because of the total mess in the club. They changed like 3 coaches and were buying a new player every few days.
Also, how about ” Hey Pioli I’m splashing 75% of our transfer budget on this player, I don’t know if he actually fits anywhere in the lineup or our style of play. Maybe he does Maybe he doesn’t. Thank you for your cooperation.
Questionable is a bit too nice to describe him. He is a walking injury since 2019. 449 days out in 4.5 years. That is almost 2 full seasons if you don’t count the off-season months. And he was constantly injured at Dortmund even before that, every few months something. I hope that will magically disappear at Milan but it probably won’t.
Wasted 56m euro budget last season hurt AC Milan so much too, if only last season with that budget can get 1 starter player quality in RW or maybe striker that will help reducing position AC Milan want to fix this season . Strange decision why activate buy option junior & florenzi last season ? Both are old & injury prone,now it is hard to get rid both of them ( florenzi get high wage 3m euro nett ) . Buying false nine 35m euro while your coach not used false nine in his system , it is still mystery too
Dude, Pioli obviously had a say in transfers before and he has now. What is a mystery exactly?
Dude, do you by any chance see pioli use false nine or SS in his time coach AC Milan ? CDK in club brugge best position are SS & false nine . Pioli try him as AMF and he failed,belgium coach u21 try him as AMF too and he failed. Now how to growing this CDK if he is not suit with pioli system high press, it is homework for new management AC Milan
Man, it is clear Pioli had a say in transfers. What is wrong with you? You made up something again, stop fantasizing. Things don’t happen inside of your head, that isn’t reality…
The previous strategy (that brought us a scudetto and a quick resurgence) was to surround young players with cheap veterans, it worked for Zlatan, Giroud, Kjaer, but it’s still football and you can’t win every time. Messias was a cheap opportunity and Florenzi has tons of experience at the European and international levels.
Now I’m sorry for you guys that are defending this ownership with all your heart like you are their lawyers or their PR, saying they have big ambitions, and now Scaroni says it all without filter haha it would be so funny if it wasn’t that tragic in the same time.
We don’t defend the ownership we are giving them a chance to to see if they will succeed or fail. To sink or swim.
Same opportunity this ownership gave Maldini throughout last season to prove himself and he sank.
Unlike the Maldini groupies here, who have already convinced themselves that they will fail just because they fired Maldini.
That’s the difference
Yeah, well I don’t think that buying Chelsea cripples will be any good, so I will critique any mediocre signings that are coming in. Still didn’t see a really good and reliable player join.
@Martin wasn’t Maldini trying to sign those 2 Chelsea cripples before he was shown the door?
RLC yes, for Pulisic I’m not sure. Whoever wanted to or signed them I don’t care. Doesn’t change anything.
Nobody defending this ownership . We are defending AC Milan . Previous management need 4 years get 1 title scudetto , new management still in their first year, give them the same chance as you give previous management. You can hate the ownership so much ,it is your choice but judging other fans that disagree with your opinion as owner lawyer or owner PR then that will make you the same with boulden ,dejan etc
Man we are literally commenting an interview in which Scaroni says explicitly that what is important is the brand, especially in the US, and that the sporting goal is to qualify for UCL, so 4th place is fine.
You and Z confirm the point, trying to attack the previous management when nobody spoke about them. They built a team going from mid table in Serie A and filled with bad players to a Scudetto and UCL semis in a few years, that’s an incredible achievement.
See your comment above . You say AC Milan cannot compete with weak italian teams in domestic. You are the one that atack AC Milan . Season still not started yet but you say this club cannot compete with weak italian team in domestic ? What reason make you say AC Milan cannot compete with weak italian teams? This team still capable winning scudetto with hard working
Bro say what you say, think what you think, I’m not attacking Milan, I express concerns about this ownership and management and I’m just saying that the voices here that were concerned by a lack of ambitions just got a confirmation from Scaroni himself saying that 4th place is enough.
Honestly , i dont care whoever ownership or management, i only support the club . Your comment above saying AC Milan cannot compete with weak italian team in domestic league , what proof or reason you have saying that ? Even in banter era AC Milan can still compete with weak italian team and not getting relegated , so sacking one employers make ACM cannot compete with weak italian club? Qualification for CL can also mean finish 1-4 in serie A but you judging ACM only want finish 4th forever in serie A. Dude move on , dont let your heart filled with hate or revenge for new management , they are still working for their 1st season and the season still not started yet
Pulisic did so well in the semis they started him in the final. Oh wait no they didn’t lol. First leg he started and scored and he assisted in the second leg. Let’s not make it look like he had the game winner or something. They were up 2-1 on agg when he came on. Also he only played only one other full match in the UCL that season and the rest were less than 25 minute appearances.
If they didnt sell tonali and signed the players they are signing and targeting I would have agreed that we are stronger, the midfield competition was going to be very exciting, but for now, we just have to see how the season will go, hoping pioli will do something extraordinary again, trusting only him since he has been doing it for the past 2 seasons, selling the core players entering their peak years is the only negative that i dissaproved, and having to restart when its not necessary, we should atleast beat inter milan🤣