A lot can happen in a few days, especially when it concerns AC Milan. The sporting director pursuit has now resumed after talks with Fabio Paratici collapsed.
Paratici will not be – barring unexpected developments – the next sporting director of Milan. It has been a whirlwind few days, starting with reports of a verbal agreement being reached between the parties, and then followed by an abrupt slowdown with the reasons still filtering out.
Just when the negotiations to define his appointment were coming to an end, things came crashing to a half. It is believed that Milan were initially calm about the situation relating to his suspension until July 20, but then things took a negative turn when they learned about his limited operability.
There was also talk that the upcoming verdict on the Prisma investigation – a criminal trial rather than a sporting one – left CEO Giorgio Furlani a bit uneasy, as did some pressure from Italian football’s governing body, the FIGC.
However, the decision to do a sharp U-turn – something this management are letting us become accustomed to, after the Julen Lopetegui case – might end up proving to be a good thing for Milan.
An expensive profile for a different project
The first point to consider is the economic issue. Paratici represents a high-level profile, accustomed to working at clubs where the budget was not an insurmountable limit, as it is at Milan, especially with the prospect of no European football.
At Juventus, the former manager won nine consecutive Scudetti, often being able to count on significant investments to bring players of the highest level to the club. This was helped by working alongside Beppe Marotta for most of his time there.
Juve almost had a monopoly on domestic talent within Serie A at the time which allowed them to pull strings and bring in Gonzalo Higuain, Paulo Dybala, Federico Chiesa, Manuel Locatelli and many more. They also had the means to go out and get Cristiano Ronaldo, unthinkable for Milan at the time.
⚖️ Oli and AJ went through a top and flop XI of Paratici signings, amid rumours he is close to joining #ACMilan ✍️
🎙 Watch in full: https://t.co/8BXrrnHIc8 pic.twitter.com/WFunQKHpw4
— SempreMilanTV (@SempreMilanTV) March 26, 2025
Even at Tottenham, although with mixed fortunes, he had the opportunity to pursue players that required significant investments like Cristian Romero, Dejan Kulusevski and Rodrigo Bentancur among others.
He persuaded the hierarchy to go out and get Antonio Conte too as a guarantee of ambition, aiming to usher in an era of success that has been long-promised and never delivered to Spurs fans, and wasn’t this time either.
Can today’s Milan guarantee similar room for manoeuvre, especially with the pre-defined condition that the new director will be part of a working group? The answer, at least for now, seems to be negative.
Coach and identity
The first major test of the Paratici-Milan project would have been the choice of head coach. If the profile were to be an established coach like Massimiliano Allegri or Conte, we could glimpse a return to the winning mentality that Paratici embodied in his time at Juventus.
The problem is that having such a demanding coach would naturally arouse expectations about a mercato to match. As mentioned, it feels as though the Rossoneri – at this current moment in time – wouldn’t be willing to splash €150m+ in one window like Napoli did to welcome Conte.
On the contrary, focusing on an emerging coach like Roberto De Zerbi or Vincenzo Italiano could give the idea of a project designed to grow over the medium-term, but with scaled-down ambitions. There were concrete rumours that both coaches were on his radar too.
At this point, a question arises spontaneously: are Milan the one who wants to adapt to Paratici’s mentality or vice versa? Without a top-tier coach, the arrival of the former Juventus director would risk being interpreted as a stopgap rather than a turning point.
Post-Marotta question marks
Another aspect that should not be underestimated is the absence of Marotta, with whom Paratici built his greatest successes. Since he emerged from the now-Inter president’s shadow, the manager has never shone in the same way, and his experience at Tottenham has demonstrated this.
Indeed, Paratici’s later years with the Bianconeri drew criticism because of high wage commitments such as the Ronaldo and Aaron Ramsey deals, while investments on certain young talents such as Romero, Merih Demiral and Weston McKennie did not pay off in the immediacy nor became part of the future core.
A spontaneous comparison with Igli Tare arises, the former Lazio director wanted by Zlatan Ibrahimovic at Milan. He is capable of building competitive teams with limited resources, as shown in his 15 years under Claudio Lotito.
If Milan want a pragmatic sporting director capable of developing talent at a low cost, Tare remains a more suitable profile. Paratici brings with him the aura of someone who has won, but without the right resources he has shown that he can flounder.
The possibility of lost time
Moving on from the theoretical and hypothetical, we arrive at the actual reasons that Milan decided not to hire Paratici. Again we start from a premise: this summer is huge for the club, and every second counts in planning for it.
Due to his suspension, multiple restrictions would be in place with Paratici until the end of July, with the importance varying. Article 9.2 states that the Italian would be unable to represent the club in a national or international setting.
This means that he could not participate in council or federal meetings which would be a problem, and he could not enter UEFA conferences. In other words, despite being the new sporting figurehead, he wouldn’t be able to ‘represent’ the club until late July.
Secondly, he could also not access the changing rooms or any adjacent rooms. This might sound trivial, but it has been well-documented that Milan are looking for someone who liaises with the squad on a day-to-day basis.
Finally, he could not engage in meetings with players or agents, which renders him effectively useless until the middle of the mercato. That, we believe, is the crucial sticking point that has forced the hierarchy to reconsider.
Now, we must wait and see what the powers that be ultimately decide. Football often presents many sliding doors moments, and the decision to turn away from Paratici certainly feels like a defining one in Milan’s future course.
Articles like these only show Milan have incompetent buffoons as either their PR or management guys. Why all the media “leaks” and days of hyping the candidate when a thorough job was not done to even understand if he was available?
Were the court case details captured in some foreign dialect that required Milan to decode, and we could not understand that Until they were drafting contracts? Were they ignorant he had a criminal case in court?
Why are they placing the cart before the horse? Simple logic states that you first evaluate if he will be available before wasting time holding meetings on strategy & future plans. Would you want to be associated with a DS tainted with exposed and detailed allegations of fraud and sharp practices?
Media outlets churn out stories to edify their paymasters and put them in the public eye. Even journalists have their allegiances. Milan is a mess. Foundational year resetting after each season.
They knew but wanted to buy themselves time to have an excuse to make late additions in the window instead of buying and organizing the right players once it opens. One thing under Redbird that was consistent is less than 20 mill per player, or an overall outlay of 40 million euros max factoring in sales. Also missing out on “primary”, more expensive targets to save a couple pennies, thus only giving the impression they were in negotiations to then go for super cheap last minute deals when other teams hijacked. Which was probably their true intent in the first place. They completely depleted our winning roster and failed to reinvest in the squad with like for like players. All we had to do was retain our scudetto team, add a rw, theo sub and a new striker. they had 3 seasosn to do that but did expensive revamps which completely failed.
2 rockets goals by Declan Rice from set pieces vs Real Madrid.
What a player.
He is bossing the midfield for Arsenal vs Real Madrid.
Arsenal are destroying Real Madrid, playing without a striker.
bring Maldini as sporting director
and Gasperini as coach
I don’t buy that Paratici’s suspension had anything to do with Milan cooling on him.
How was it that I knew he would not be eligible until the new season (i.e. 1 July) which would mean that he’d be at least a month late starting?
My suspicion is that his camp aggressively put his name forward and that Milan indicated an openness to the idea.
It’s not like the world wasn’t already aware that Paratici hasn’t done anything without an enormous budget and Marotta. But we do know that he was potentially a very good chance of bringing Conte with him. That’s a legitimate scenario for Milan to explore because it’s the closest thing to a guarantee of Champions League qualification that money can buy.
Is Conte now Napoli or Juve only and hence Paratici no longer of use? Or is it just a case of Milan working through the due diligence and realising that there is basically nothing in Paratici’s history that suggests he is compatible with what Milan needs at this point in time (as determined by financial restrictions, etc).
Is it a blessing not to have Conte is that was the reason for the interest in Paratici (having crunched the numbers and being aware that they could mould the squad sufficiently for Conte)? I’m not sure that’s the word I would use.
I am happy that this now seems to have forced Milan into the D’Amico corner. The guy’s history is basically flawless. Whether it’s building the Verona squad to the point that most of the starting 11 could be sold twice with Hellas still surviving (almost all of the January 2024 fire sale players were recruited directly by D’Amico – including Hien who he signed for Atalanta), cashing in on Hojlund, and doing every he has done at Atalanta over the past 2 seasons.
He’s the perfect guy for Red Bird. The coach is very much secondary to getting in someone who can construct a squad properly.