AC Milan have taken inspiration from the ‘Manchester City model’ and it will influence the way they operate from now on, a report claims.
Tuttosport (via MilanNews) compares Milan to Manchester City and not because of the signings like Erling Braut Haaland or Joško Gvardiol who cost €60m and €90m respectively, but rather the youth-led philosophy.
There is also a Real Madrid flavour, given that at the beginning of the 2000s they wanted to promulgate with the slogan ‘Zidanes y Pavones’. It is when Los Blancos combined the Galacticos bought for millions with the products of their own youth team.
City are doing the same now. Pep Guardiola launched Phil Foden when he was 17 years old and now he is arguably their best player, then there are other names like Cole Palmer (sold for big money), James McAtee, Claudio Echeverri, Cavan Sullivan and Micah Hamilton.
Milan would like to do the same or to try replicate it to some extent. Thus, they will focus heavily on the jewels who are coming through the academy while also signing players like Álex Jiménez from Real Madrid and Davide Mastrantonio from Roma.
The club wanted to create Milan Futuro to help this process and that will give senior playing time to Mattia Liberali, Lorenzo Torriani, Kevin Zeroli, Davide Bartesaghi and obviously Francesco Camarda. Playing in a professional league will speed up and complete their maturation.