Oh I perfectly agree with you. It's the other 90% of the fanbase you need to convince.
I mean yes, cut the emotion, sell high, reinvest smart, repeat. Sounds clean. Efficient. Sustainable. Just like the NFL model you mention.
But football isn’t the NFL. There’s no draft. No salary cap. No parity. You can't just "create another Theo or Rafa" at will, because once a player becomes someone, every club in Europe knows their name – and their agent's number. You're not working in a vacuum.
Sure, Milan "made" Theo and Rafa. But that was once. If it were that easy to find the next version of them, every club would be doing it. Reality is: scouting is hit-or-miss, development takes time, time we don't have as seen this year, and replacements don’t come pre-assembled with Serie A experience and Champions League pedigree. You can’t just slap a 10M kid from Ligue 1 into San Siro and expect him to boss the left flank like Theo during Scudetto season. Not always. But try to explain that to a fanbase who still lives off the nostalgia from 15 years ago.
And yes, we can let players go early – but you better believe the second their replacements falter, the same media and fanbase will scream bloody murder. We've seen it. Here. In the press. In television. In San Siro during the protests. This club got crucified for selling Tonali, even if the logic behind the deal was sound. We sold him at his peak value and reinvested. Some fans still call it betrayal. Imagine if we’d done the same with Theo or Leao two years ago.
Also, don’t underestimate the cost of being cold-blooded. Constant churn means no identity. No continuity. No emotional anchor. That’s not just sentiment – that’s value too. A club like Milan lives off its mythology. Off players who
feel like Milan. Take that away, and what are you left with? A talent farm? A stepping stone?
I’m not saying we should give in to every wage demand. Far from it. I'm actually arguing the opposite, just like you. But pretending this is purely a business ignores that football, especially at a club like Milan, is also theatre, emotion and loyalty – or at least the illusion of it. Otherwise we’re just Brighton in red and black.
So yeah – players may have the right to ask for what they think they're worth. But clubs also have the right to draw lines. Only that the majority of the fanbase will always take the players side and become their first defenders when arguing about wage demands. As if them making the players even richer somehow helps the club.
The problem is: when we draw those lines, we get punished harder than the ones inflating the market. Because we’re not Bayern, we’re not City, we’re not PSG or Madrid. And that middle ground – trying to compete while staying sustainable – is the tightrope we walk. I'm aware of that. Most of fans aren't and players and agents don't give a fuck.
So long story short: It's not that simple. And with that I made full circle
.
And you're spot on: Milan has to find that middle ground. We're not oil-backed, but we're also not a second-tier stepping stone. We need to be smart, tough when needed, ruthless, but not robotic.
