Zvonimir Boban and Paolo Maldini admit they have “a different vision” of Milan to Elliott Management, while Ivan Gazidis has an unusual description for football.
The Serie A giants are owned by a US hedge fund, who effectively repossessed the club after Yonghong Li defaulted on repayments for the loan he used to purchase the Rossoneri from Silvio Berlusconi.
The Financial Times published its profile of the situation and issues emerge between the sporting and business side of the club.
“No young team, with all young players, won the Champions League. That’s a fact,” said director and Milan legend Maldini.
“Even a Scudetto,” added fellow director and former teammate Boban.
“Our dream is to have results tomorrow. [Elliott] have a different path, they have a different vision . . . I think we can find a way that we’re both happy.”
Milan also brought in former Arsenal CEO Gazidis with the aim of increasing revenue, which currently stands at approximately half that of Juventus in endorsement agreements alone.
Gazidis gave the Financial Times an interesting description for the sport.
“It’s not an intellectually challenging business. It’s emotionally challenging . . . Fundamentally, we’re talking about a group of 23-year-old millionaires kicking a piece of leather into a basket . . . Millions of people around the world invest their self-esteem in their ability to do that well.”
New Milan chief revenue officer Casper Stylsvig was also unimpressed with the situation he found at San Siro.
“It is probably too much to call it Stone Age but [AC Milan’s] commercial team was definitely 10 years behind the Premier League and probably two, three years behind the top clubs in Italy.”
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