On the day that marks the completion of Alvaro Morata’s move to AC Milan, a lot of supporters have been asking the same question: how did he end up being the chosen one?
Through our colleagues at SempreMilan.it, we can piece together the full background on the move. The starting point is that the hunt for a new striker began practically at the end of last season when it was certain that Olivier Giroud would not renew and would head for the United States.
It is a search that the management initially linked together with the hunt for a new head coach and they wanted the two protagonists of the ‘miracle’ that Bologna achieved last season: Thiago Motta and Joshua Zirkzee.
Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Geoffrey Moncada were the men put in charge of putting the pieces in place for the post-Pioli era, and in their minds they wanted the exciting young Italian coach plus the talented Dutch forward as the head coach and new No.9.
However, the first blow came regarding Motta. Milan stalled on making a call regarding Pioli’s fate after a run of wins which coincided with Juventus’ decline under Max Allegri. They decided to dismiss him and were already far along in talks with Motta, who kept his word despite Milan’s attempts.
The commission issue
Having lost the chance to hire Motta, Milan focused solely on Zirkzee, first trying to unravel the mystery related to the release clause that was built into his contract and what influence Bayern Munich had.
Among Moncada’s moves, as we reported, there was a meeting with Bayern (the striker’s former club) in which the Rossoneri received confirmation of the existence of a €40m clause that is valid not only for the Bundesliga team but for all clubs.
Having established this, Milan immediately mobilised with Bologna, communicating their intention to pay the entire clause. However, it was more difficult to get in touch with Zirkzee, who was called up by Ronald Koeman for the European Championship after some injuries.
The negotiations therefore did not take place directly with the player but with his agent Kia Joorabhchian, a name now known not exactly in a positive way among Milan fans.
The story with Zirzkee’s agent is now famous: Moncada and Giorgio Furlani did not find an agreement regarding the high commissions requested (€15m) and they froze the negotiations after Manchester United entered.
Change of plan
The follow-up question that has been put forward by fans is along the lines of how Milan then went from a young profile worth €40m+ to one nine years older with a much lower transfer fee.
Well, the Morata idea did not arise the day after the collapse of the Zirkzee deal but several months earlier. The Spanish forward had even been a target of Milan last summer when Moncada went in person to speak with the former Juve man, who did not want to leave Atletico Madrid.
This caused things to dry up in terms of contacts between the Rossoneri and Morata, but then Ibrahimovic arrived. Shortly before the appointment of Paulo Fonseca, it was the Swede who took the reins by contacting him in person, all while he had expressed concerns about staying at Atleti.
To simplify even more, while Furlani and Moncada were carrying out negotiations for Zirkzee and hoping to unlock the door on the commissions front, Zlatan was working on the ‘plan B’ so they could quickly switch if needed.
The real green light for Morata came a few days before the official presentation of Fonseca as the new Milan coach at Casa Milan. In a meeting held in the city with the coach there were a number of options presented, and he picked the 31-year-old.
The crucial clause
The real turning point in the Morata-Milan story came from the Spanish training retreat at Euro 2024, where Morata had explicitly declared his intention to leave LaLiga because he did not feel at home in his own country.
Milan were already aware of the existence of a rather low release clause (€13m) in Morata’s contract with Los Rojiblancos. However, they needed the forward himself to open up to the move, otherwise triggering that clause would have been for nothing.
Step forward Giuseppe Bozzo, the mediator of the operation. Through him the entire economic side regarding the salary was defined, which was a quick negotiation but not necessarily simple given the initial reluctance of Milan to offer the a four-year deal at €5m net per season.
Ibra’s conviction but also, it must be said, the lack of ‘affordable’ alternatives (when factoring in the transfer fee) then led the directors and the ownership to give in, accepting the player’s demands almost entirely.
We arrive today. Morata has just become European Champion wearing the captain’s armband of his national team and in the last few hours he underwent medical tests with his new club. Milan closes a soap opera that perhaps initially had other protagonists, but has a happy ending.
We Celebrate 125 years. This Management Opens a store, Special Jersey and host friendly event. All this “Celebration” is costing MilanFans Money. Instead of Buy great players and show the fans that they have ambition they just using this milestone to take more money from the fans . We dont want special design Jersey. We want special players.
If I go to one this Milanstore and want to buy something Let’s say cost 300 Euro am gonna put 100 euro on table just like this management does with every club they negotiate with. This Management are embarrassing.
What a stupid take.
So why open a store? Pretty sure it’s to make money. Making money from the fans, oh my god what club does that! Oh right, all of them, that’s how they exist.
If you go to buy a car do you just pay the asking price or see if you can get a better deal? Most people would start low, know their max price and see if they can get the other side down below that. Why is this so hard to understand?
You missed the point, or didn’t want to see it. Fans “invest” their money in the club, like some shareholders. They expect ROI and in this case it’s sporting results. 19% of increase for the season pass and in return fans have Paulo Fonseca haha
Also if your car’s price tag says 20k and you offer 10k to the salesman, he’ll just laugh at you and ask you to leave.
If you read that article . They want to sign motta first not fonseca but juve already in long talk with motta and motta want to join juve, there is nothing you can do to force motta coming to ACM. They also want to pay 40m euro for JZ but only if kia accept 6m euro commission not 15m euro but in the end kia have full control his player and can decide his player next destination, you dont want player that can be controlled by agent . I only dont like they play waiting game for fofana with monaco , it is too risky
At the end Zirkzee joins Man United for around 45 mil in 3 years instalment pay. Less than 40 mil transfer fee and 15mil agent fee. So we miss something from the whole story here!!! Maybe our sincere management didn’t have the strong intention to sign him!!!
I don’t know why all this is so hard to understand for some people. And never any other solutions or options – just endless whining at whatever management does.
Spot on
“Also if your car’s price tag says 20k and you offer 10k to the salesman, he’ll just laugh at you and ask you to leave.”
They don’t. They REALLY don’t ask you to leave.
Haha.
Seriously, they may not ask you to leave but they sure as hell are gonna walk away and spend their time with genuine customers, not time wasters
Exactly. Milan treated their targets like second hand cars, hence the low bid. No one with sane mind goes to a showroom for a new car bidding half the price.
You can bid down 90-80% of the price of players and taken Seriously or just be a clown and bid 50%.
The thing is though they are not cars lol. They are professionals and they have contracts. Their value is affected by that contract. They also have a will. They can choose not to go anywhere.
He is also an investment because once he signs for Milan – one injury can plummet his value. If you are smart in anything in life – you try to get the best possible deal so you can mitigate the risk of your investment.
Also Fofana is a good player but he isn’t exactly spectacular. 99% of us wouldn’t know him if it wasn’t for the fact that he is linked with us. So yeah start at $10mil and see where the negotiation goes.
But yeah Monaco will never say no and blackball is because they won’t let him leave for nothing.
Morata is far better than zirke, for him they bought a great player. You can’t just spend money on players who can’t guarantee you. Kudos to the management for this.
Agreed.
They got this one right in my view even if Morata is a failure and Zirkzee is a blazing success I won’t critics the management for making what is on paper the right move going for an experienced, winner (especially after losing Kjaer and Giroud).
Morate can’t carry this team if Leo, Theo or Puli are injured or out of form, last season other teams understood those players were the only ace off our sleave and they planned their tactics accordingly and we struggled.
Zirkzee on the other hand brings something different, he is strong, holds the ball, hass pace running from the middle, dribbles and is still growing and definitely has a future resale value.
If morata lasts for a year or three it’s back to the market for us with no resale value, that’s dumb, this Morata now is probably not a 24 games player.
The way an ambitious management works, you are either bringing in equal quality or surpassing the quality you already have, Milan keeps doing patch work after patchwork.
The only strength of Morata is his luck and agent. Nth more.
Expectations: Zirkzee
Reality: Morata
Me: Fine
Yeah, but just about fine. Any profile slightly weaker than Morata everyone would be rightfully p*ssed. And we definitely need another striker, otherwise it’s last season all over again (with Morata and Giroud swapping roles). And this is best case scenario.
Last season where we didn’t have problems scoring goals but had no midfield?
I’d prefer to focus on the huge gaping hole in our midfield.
🚨 Füllkrug has given his full availability to join Milan showing great enthusiasm to make the move happen. Borussia Dortmund’s request is around €15M. It’s now up to Milan to open negotiations with BVB
[@DiMarzio]
Morata + Fulkrug for only 28 mil combined. Can’t beat that. Each of them is coming off a season with 26 goal contributions.
Get it done.
Also.
🚨Milan have a concrete interest in Samardzic. Milan’s primary midfield target is Youssouf Fofana however Samardzic is not an alternative but is considered an opportunity to be snapped up by Milan.
Milan will meet with Samardzic’s father-agent in the next few days to understand the deal feasibility
[@DiMarzio]
As expected, Samardzic would be coming in along with Fofana, not instead of Fofana.
If Fonseca has Milan playing 4231 Samardzic would be great fit in the 10 role.
Get it done.
If we really after an experienced striker with pretty decent records to begin with, might as well we got Taremi (who just involved in all goals in his friendly debut). Yes the one we chased all summer last TW, the one we could get for free. No need to splash 20-30 mil.
Once again this shows the management still lack proper planning. Their move is all about reactive one instead of properly planned & targeted move. We didn’t get Motta then we moved to Fonseca. We didn’t get Zirkzee then we moved to Morata. We dind’t get Buongiorno then we moved to Pavlovic or that Portugal guy. And all that with a proper narrative that makes the move seems like a properly planned, a requested by coach, a Zlatan master mind, etc.
I think Taremi’s agent burned his bridges with Milan last summer, with that last minute demand for more money.
His stats for last season weren’t great, Jovic turned out to be a much better deal.
No reason to re-visit that piece of turd again.
Fine For Me
Lol. How exactly does this have a happy ending? Now it’s happening again with Fofana. For people saying we will get Fofana and Lazar, come on, are you RedBird shills or what? And for sure it will happen with whatever CB we supposedly “try to get,” only to settle a couple of weeks later for the most random and mediocre guy. The rationale will either be: “He’s young but with lots of potential, qualities that can be exploited by Fonseca,” or “Yeah, he’s past his prime, but he brings leadership and experience, so needed after Kjaer and Giroud’s departure.”
As I’ve said time and again, as long as the player is cheap, they will always find a way to sell that he fits perfectly into the system (of mediocrity) and that he was actually a target months ago.
Lazar has the same vibe as Hakan. He will betray the fans
Yeh we’re not incontinent with fear so we’re RedBird shills…