r/ACMilan • u/AutoModerator • 1d ago

Monday Discussion Thread

Great place for team discussion/whatever Serie A related topics you would like to bring up. Examples: Transfers, rumors, players from other teams, things you miss about the old days etc. Whatever you want as long as it isn't too off-topic.

Also a good spot to ask about the stadium, the city of Milano, bars, fan clubs in your city etc.

Here are some important links for new members:

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u/random_civ_321 1d ago

Who is We? Milan fans? I don't know for a fact that Tonali asked to leave and I follow Milan news almost daily. All I've heard is that an offer was made and both Milan and Tonali found it acceptable.

The narrative can also be presented also that Milan asked him to leave... Heck rumours at the time were that Tonali cried when he was signing the new contract, and looked anything but happy when he was transferring to Newcastle. Him saying that it had to be done after the tranfer, and pushing to leave are two different things. And yes, we all know he was pissed after Maldini got fired. Completely different story for Rejnders.

Unless you have a source saying that Tonali pushed to join Newcastle, I'd call your statement unfounded.

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u/ComradePoula Simon Kjaer 1d ago

I don't know. His fucking agent? The Athletic's report on the whole situation? Pretty much every single reputable source has said that Newcastle agreed a deal with Tonali before they had even approached us.

If you genuinely believe that poor Tonali was crying because the evil Americans forced him to leave, I genuinely don't know what to tell you.

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u/random_civ_321 1d ago

Again, "pushing to leave" and "accepting offer" are two different things. Did Nesta accept to leave Lazio for Milan? Yes. Did Nesta push to leave Lazio? Hell no!!!

You appear to feel very strongly about this conversation, so I'm not sure if I'm wasting time writing this, but I'm willing to try and explain my point again since in your prior posts that I've read your thoughts are rational.

From NY Times / Athletic

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/4655468/2023/07/03/inside-sandro-tonali-newcastle-transfer/

So what happened? In the week beginning June 12, Milan officials were in London for a routine intelligence-gathering mission to plan their approach for the transfer window. Chelsea had spoken to them about Tonali around the time of the Champions League semi-finals and had come armed with a list of three of their players to offer as collateral; Milan thought they may still be interested. Liverpool, it is understood, were also monitoring him. (for context, Maldini was sacked in June 6)....

On Tuesday June 20, Newcastle submitted an opening offer of €50million (£43m, $54.5m). By Wednesday, Ashworth and Nickson were holding face-to-face talks in Milan at the Palazzo Parigi Hotel, with the player’s representative Giuseppe Riso...

https://www.themag.co.uk/2023/06/milan-media-now-resigned-to-sandro-tonoli-departure-to-newcastle-united-this-sums-it-up/

The mood perhaps best summed up by Carlo Pellegatti, a lifelong fan and a journalist / broadcaster / commentator who has covered AC Milan for the past forty years.

He says he has discovered that Newcastle United first approached AC Milan back in May and that the deal has now ‘evolved’ tyo the point where the move appears certain...

I'm not going to try and convince you that Tonali is the naive defender and that the Milan management is the bad calculating wolf, that would be very hard to do without explicit tangible proof. What I'm trying to make you consider is something far less evil, that Milan management was already considering selling Tonali, and that Tonali (or his agent) were aware of that.

As a parting thought, I'll leave this question to you: Do you think that Milan would have sold Tonali that summer if Maldini was not sacked?

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u/ComradePoula Simon Kjaer 1d ago

So, let's rationalize this. Milan's position has always been the same; no player is untouchable. If the offer matches what we want, it's up to the player to decide.

Newcastle acted quicker. A deal with Tonali was already pretty much in place before they went to negotiate with Milan and the Serie A club

Directly from Athletic article.

Even in the article you linked they say this

Opportunity knocked for Newcastle; the word on the grapevine was if they could convince the player first then there was a possibility of persuading AC Milan into a deal. “Things changed, so we moved accordingly,”
Green light given — the deal was driven by Ashworth, Nickson and Andy Howe, in conjunction with Newcastle’s head coach — there could be no leaks; coming so soon after the sacking of technical director Paolo Maldini, a club legend, selling Tonali was particularly sensitive for Milan, while Newcastle were desperate to avoid an auction.
The Athletic was told by authoritative sources there were no substantive talks with Inter about Barella and no agent was mandated by Newcastle to speak to them. It was, however, a convenient smokescreen.

With public attention trained on Barella, Newcastle moved quickly and under the radar; a lack of rumour meant a lack of pressure on Milan. A little to their surprise, given his lifelong association with the club — “born a Milanista, the son of a Milanista father who took him to the curva as a child,” as Gazzetta put it — their enquiries suggested Tonali had a genuine enthusiasm about moving to the Premier League and taking on the challenge of turning Newcastle into trophy-winners.

So what we know is that they did contact Tonali first, and he agreed to the move before they even contacted us. They then finalized the negotiations with his agent and with Milan in the following days.

I don't really care whether or not Maldini would have sold him, that's not my problem. This is a grown ass adult that didn't keep his word the moment someone threw him the bag. And yeah, him agreeing to leave before there was any contacts with us is pretty much the same as wanting to leave. We just don't hold people hostage over transfer fees.

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u/random_civ_321 1d ago

him agreeing to leave before there was any contacts with us

I just showed you that was not the case, with quotes from articles, both Newcastle had approached us, and Milan management was including him in sale talks. This was from NY Times/Athletic and quotes from Pellegati. Can we please agree on that. It wasn't 'Oh no, Tonali wants to leave, what are we going to do', it was 'Oh yes, Tonali also wants to leave, we won't have another PR nightmare when we sell him'

I read your quote, as part of the article, but gave me a different point of view from yours. The way I understood it, is that they knew that if they were able to convince Tonali of a potential move, then the rest would be smooth sailing, and that snippet was following exactly my first quote that showed that Milan management was open to selling him a week prior to that. We'd have to agree to disagree if you still genuinely believe that was not the case.

If a grown adult finds out that his club is talking of selling him to other clubs, how do you think he'd react, especially after they sacked one of his idols (Maldini) which for some of the players, including Tonali, was unjustified. It's like having a big fight with your partner, and then a few days later finding out that he/she has opened a Tinder account. i don't care what loyalty claims you've made up to that point as a grown adult, you accept that it's time to move on and rip the bandaid off.