AC Milan fans are rightly worried heading into the summer, after a disastrous 2024-25 campaign and the rumours of big sales being needed.
As Tuttosport reports this morning, as if potentially finishing ninth in the league and missing out on European football were not enough, in all the newspapers there is nothing but talk of Milan needing to sell players because of a worsening financial situation.
It is no secret that Tijjani Reijnders is in the sights of Manchester City, who are trying to replace Kevin De Bruyne. Milan have already shown their hand in the recent past by agreeing to sell Sandro Tonali for a huge offer, someone who had a huge attachment to the club.
Reijnders sale not needed?
However, the paper points towards something that could negate the need to cash in on Reijnders: the sale of Theo Hernandez. A contract renewal with the French full-back seems far from likely, but his departure is certainly probable.
The Rossoneri fans could never accept two favourites leaving the team in the same summer, so if they had to choose, their choice would fall on Theo, despite his appearance as part of the promotional material in the presentation of the new 2025-26 kit
Theo’s performances have largely been negative this season, at least compared to the standards he has set for himself, and that is another reason why the fan base would be more in favour of ‘sacrificing’ the former Real Madrid man.
It is possible that both Hernandez and Reijnders leave, too. Without the Champions League there is a need to replenish the accounts and two sales of this kind would provide much-needed oxygen for the accounts.
It has been said that Theo can be bought at a bargain price given his contract that expires in a year, while with Reijnders there is much more profit margin, given that he has a deal until 2030 and probably will not push to leave.
Other sales
The projected €25m loss for the 2024-25 financial year could be helped if Juventus permanently sign Pierre Kalulu for €14m, after paying a €3m loan fee. Juve seem intent on exercising this option, but the two clubs will also have to figure out when to register the operation.
If it were to be done within this sporting and financial year, Milan’s losses would drop to €11m. If the deal were to materialise bureaucratically from July 1 onwards, the Diavolo could begin to create the cushion needed to bridge the gap from not being in Europe next season.
Looking ahead, in fact, Milan could end up with a deficit of €80m next season, which will make it necessary not only to return immediately to the Champions League, but also to sell players who are not part of the technical project and who may be in the market.
This is why it will be essential for the club to cash in on the sales of Tommaso Pobega, Alexis Saelemaekers (both could produce big capital gains), Yacine Adli, Ismael Bennacer, Lorenzo Colombo, Samuel Chukwueze, Noah Okafor and perhaps even Malick Thiaw.
Between Theo and Reijinders I guess nowadays its a nobrainer…
I would be fine with Theo, Thiaw “sacrifice”… Thiaw is 50-50 atm, either gonna be a beast or one of those players that never materialized, if we are to get 35M from Leverkusen/Bayern today, it’s a no brainer….
Thiaw is the only one who knows how to play out of the back out of the bunch.
He knows how to and is a great defender, but he loses confidence very quickly. As a defender you can’t let that happen.
Funny how that works when you play with poor defenders around you…
Theo is not with us, his head is in Madrid, Munich, Manchester or somewhere else. So yeah, the sell is inevitable.
Regarding Tij, if we can bring 2 good Italian MF for this money, I guess we should take it…
If Tare somehow manages Ricci, Udogie, Comuzzo, Coppola that would already fix most of our problems
What a shame that we need to dismantle championship team just to build a selling team
It was a plan from the very beginning of Cardinale’s reign. Sell a pillar player, buy bunch of could bees for 20 millions and hope for high returns.
Maldini did not pay for those who left on a free or because of Origi, CdK deals. He was sacked because he was an obstacle for Gerry’s vision of buy low sell high business model while compete for top 4.
The only reason for us to sell our best players are because they want to leave (not surprising) or because of stupid management.
We may have a small deficit this year but not much as we played in CL.
Next season will be the problem, however that good be offset by a winning season.
We have a fortune tied up in players on loan and in players who we need to sell.
CDK money is still owed 20m or so
Kalulu (should be keeping) 14m
Adli 10m
Pobega 10m
Alexis (we should keep) 20m
Okafor 15m
Bennacer 15m
Morata 10m
Calabria 7m
Colombo 5m
Pellegrini 3m
Vazquez 2m
In our squad
Musah 10m
RLC 15m
Chucky 15m
Emerson 10m
Thats over 180m worth of expendible players. Plenty to cover losses and to fund some signings
Mike/Sportiello/Torriani
Walker/Tomori Thiaw/Gabbia Pav/Bart
Jimenez/Alexis Tiji/Zeroli Fofana/Ricci Theo/Alexis
Pulisic/? Jovic/Gimenez Leao/Okafor
In the above scenario we keep Alexis/Okafor for depth, so thats 35m out of the 180m. Buy Ricci for 35m. Add a good young winger for 20m.
Final result – we have 90m left to cover losses
It’s all about having some ambition and convincing the players to stay
Oh an hiring a good manager
Dude it’s not how things functioning.
Selling players for amount is not equal to a total amount that is showed in books as capital. Missing ucl next year means deficit of 100 million euros. By rules, they need to cut loses or capital gain from sales for that amount.
Capital gain, for example is: Reijnders sale for 70 million – his ammortisation 12 million = 58 of capital gain. Still club needs 48 million to break even with 100 million of loses .
How is decrease of loses function ? For example removing players that sucks. If you sell Ruben Loftus for 9 million, capital gain is only 1 million, but cost side would decrease costs for 9 million how much is his salary plus ammortisation. …
And you stayed without 1 player in midfield. Where Bondo or Zeroli can backnup. But what’s about result.
So don’t just put outside transfer fees which they don’t have any connections with how sheet is functioning.
The losses aren’t 100mil. The projected deficit is only apparently 25mil.
I think he’s talking about next year. But even so if all those players are sold we’d be fine (and that’s a big IF that other clubs want those players at those prices). Sure we might not have the full amount but will be able to cover the losses handily as sjf said. My guess they might think it’s better to sell one good player. But we do have to trim the team anyways (we have way more than 25). By being a selling club however those prices decrease. We might be looking at alot of swaps in the future
You make some excellent points regarding the balance sheet etc.
I do think there is plenty of capital gains available in those players as many have been at Milan for years and several have been developed.
The prices I listed were conservative with many below the values stated on transfermarkt.
Lets be honest we’d sell Emerson for a can of coke and a twix
25m in the red is still within UEFA parameters. I thought the losses would be higher tbh but I’m guessing that 15-20m spent on the Futuro will write off some of the losses in terms of UEFA requirements. We can still keep the team in tact at those levels. An owner can commit more than that directly to cover losses (up to 60m over three years I think..stand corrected on that). So if we had an owner that could do that sort of thing without having to sell to self fund or cover losses then we need not worry about losing our players. But we don’t.
In other news, Okafor is about to be Serie A champions. Pobega and Calabria Coppa champions! Reality is that you have to leave Milan to win any trophies.