AC Milan are taking their time before making a decision on whether to pay more for Youssouf Fofana but in the meantime an alternative idea has come up in Richard Rios, a report claims.
According to Sky, Fofana has long been the profile that the Milan management has identified for the midfield and they will wait until the end of this week to present a new offer to Monaco.
An agreement with the Frenchman has now been reached in principle over personal terms but a deal with Monaco has not yet been struck, as they continue to ask for around €25m.
The 25-year-old remains a target, with Geoffrey Moncada and the other directors also leveraging Fofana’s desire to come to Italy, but they only want to pay what they feel is a fair price given that his deal runs out in 11 months
The alternative to Fofana is Richard Rios, a Colombia international who is 23 years of age and currently plays for Palmeiras. He has made 29 appearances so far this season, with Rios also taking part in the Copa America.
Colombia went on a great run in that tournament in the USA and only lost in the final 1-0 to Argentina. Rios plays mainly in front of the defence, which is exactly what Milan need, but can also operate as a box-to-box player.
i.e. milan won’t sign Fofana, some english club will end up taking over the player
Fired Furlani he is a joke…..
Below is from an article on Tottenham website with quote from professional scout
“Italian teams, particularly AC Milan, sell expensive but don’t like to spend big money, do they?
“Emerson is a versatile player and I expect Tottenham will therefore be looking for a minimum fee of £12million. That bid from AC Milan is ridiculous, clubs are paying more than that for 17-year-olds.”
Milan and Spurs have been discussing a deal for Emerson for quite some time. Therefore, after those discussions, it seems strange that the Serie A side would table such a low bid.
They would have surely been aware that the offer would be knocked back by Tottenham, and it seems as if putting together the offer was a waste of time for everybody involved.
Milan are yet to return with an improved offer for Emerson, with interest emerging from the likes of Borussia Dortmund and clubs in Saudi Arabia.
Yeah Milan is a joke for the rest of Europe these days. I live in Milan and didn’t see a Milan jersey for two months while there are Inter flags all around the city at balconies and windows. Strange but Italian people seem to celebrate titles and don’t seem to celebrate the budget. Middle age thing surely.
Before I get accused of being a RedBird lover, I agree we need to stop the lowballing, and the one place I’ve been consistent in my criticism is the handling of transfers.
However, that comment from some random spurs scout requires pushback more than anything else. People pay more than that for 17 year olds in England – nowhere else. The EPL is solely responsible for making the transfer market the circus it is today, and there are plenty on here who buy into that, demanding best part of a new team every summer.
If Spurs put a little faith in Emerson Royal instead of casting him aside for the next shiny new toy they can turn into content, he might not now be sitting around losing talent and value. They deserve to lose vast sums of money on him.
Don’t point to awful EPL clubs – especially one of THE most awful EPL clubs, when highlighting out issues.
I agree with most of what you say.
However it is still very relevant that professionals in the game, people we need to do business with are considering us time wasters
Put simply, if a club is aking €25m for a player you don’t start negotiating by offering 10, it’s just antagonising and a waste of everyones time.
If Milan feel the club is asking far too much, they can simply say from the start, sorry we don’t value him anything close to that and move on.
You don’t ask permission to negotiate with the player and have them try to force a move for a fraction of what the club is asking.
Anyway, I’m just referencing an article I thought was relevant and the opinion of a pro on how Milan are conducting their business. It’s not a good long term strategy
I don’t disagree with you on that at all. I do think there are always more moving parts than we learn in the papers and your average fan gets angry about financial arrangements they couldn’t begin to comprehend (not a dig at you, but there is so much hot air on here). We also have every right to value a player at half what his club does.
However, the stories of us lowballing are too frequent for there to be nothing behind them. I actually think Redbird have done some great things, but the transfer strategy team (which is what modern fans care about most – its the first place they look when results aren’t forthcoming) is ‘hodgepodge’ and needs professionalising. They’ve failed to understand that however good they might be at running a business, they still need a Galliani to do good ‘football’ business.
Yeah perhaps bringing in an experienced negotiator who knows the relevant people would be a big help.
At the end of the day, people wan to do business with people they like and trust.
Then Moncada can focus on scouting and Furlani on running the business.
Zlatan can continue making bizarre social media posts
Even my happy with MGMT self must agree that where there is smoke there is fire.
The observation that folks like to do biz with folks they loke really lends weight to your point.
The bids for these players are realistic and that we won’t be held to ransom by agents should be lauded and is an example for others to follow. No one will pay more than €10-15 million for Emerson Royal, he’s garbage. Fofana has a year left on his contract. If Monaco play the waiting game, they risk losing him for nothing.
“Fofana has a year left on his contract. If Monaco play the waiting game, they risk losing him for nothing.”
If 10M€ is what they’re gonna get, then losing him for free is acceptable.
Bingo, because for 10m they risk not being able to find an affordable replacement and the difference in money is something they can offset through qualifying for Europe or winning a few more games.
Not to mention, he’s a French international, they’ll be able to find five English clubs willing to pay double that if they wait a few weeks.
@papa I agree for the most part.
However it’s interesting you mentioned Spurs putting faith in their players. “If Spurs put a little faith in Emerson Royal instead of casting him aside for the next shiny new toy they can turn into content”. I think we should do the same. We really don’t even need a right back and it would probably stunt the growth of the up and coming youth players too. We HAD to get a striker and at least a DM. Other than that really we are ok and/or need to trim the squad. If there’s a true upgrade I’d welcome it but only a swap out
100% agree.
I’ve said it a few times on here in the past week – If our entire Mercato was Morata, Fofana and Pavlovic (who we don’t need in terms of numbers but I’ve always liked left footed defenders on the left), we trimmed the fat, and put faith in some of the more ready kids like Zeroli I’d be delighted.
I just hate the EPL to be honest 😀
Emerson can go take a hike. Thank God Fonseca would rather develop Kalulu than OK this buy.
Kiên nhẫn với 10$… Kaka
Cứ loanh quanh, luẩn quẩn… trong đó Guisary chỉ có giá 17$ thì không lấy… Bây giờ đang vơ bèo…
Rios is tough tackling. Saw him frustrate opponents many times, including Argentina for long stretches. But he has no European experience.
I think as far as Fofana we will settle on 20 million from what I’ve heard. They have to come down a little.
Sure a little but our first offer was 12m see how far from 30m they demanded. And our second was 15m like they other clubs aren’t idiots. You aren’t trying to get players from newer clubs. They know the business and know the difference in economics too . Like come on !
I would love to have rios over fofana in theory at least.
But lots of those players getting lost when get to Europe and we don’t really have patience with them for example paqueta…
These lowball offers are making us look bad. We have €100m to spend, why are we being so cheap… we barely spent anything so far. And Napoli ended up paying a reasonable €35m for Buongiorno. Meanwhile we run around trying to lowball everyone for quality players that fill real needs…
I think fofana will go to everton to amadou onana replacement. Everton already have 55m.
Why is it that Milan can’t afford good players?
The same fans that come here and yell the loudest that they aren’t accountants, they are FANS of AC Milan are now the ONES out here criticizing how Milan conducts business and how the initial offers we submit are too low and should be higher.
If you’re out here as a FAN foremost, then wait for a deal to go through and stand behind the trade. What the he|| does it matter what offer is submitted/accepted? All that matters is whether the player comes or doesn’t. No?
Because you are always such a thoughtful long term thinker I will direct you to @SJF comment above.
“At the end of the day, people wan to do business with people they like and trust.”
Frivolous offers and a lack of follow through hurt our ability to move in the market over the long term.
If we really want a $25m player with one year left in a deal but value him at $20m then great, offer $18m to see what the real perception of value is on the other side.
But offer 50% or less on what appears to be a consistent basis then dragging it out and dragging other players and teams in for leverage (even the player often) seems more Daniel Levi than Beppe Morrota.