AC Milan are in a rather peculiar situation as Gerry Cardinale decided to sack technical director Paolo Maldini. A decision that has upset not just the fans but also the players, as shown most recently by Mike Maignan.
This morning, La Repubblica reported that the Milan players were left in shock by the decision and are even inclined to revolt. Yacine Adli published a clear message on his Instagram, while Rafael Leao published a cryptic yet telling video.
Mike Maignan has now followed their lead. On his Instagram story, the goalkeeper published two photos of him signing the AC Milan contract. He wrote SempreMilan, with a question mark over the i and also the 👀 emoji afterwards.
📱 @mmseize on Instagram 👀 pic.twitter.com/yCTWDkV5JR
— SempreMilan (@SempreMilanCom) June 6, 2023
That is worrying 😟
The manner in which these developments occurred is unacceptable and abhorrent for someone who has almost religiously been following AC Milan for 25 years. Cardinale will finish very badly, I sense. But, that does not worry me. What worries me is that he will drag Milan down with him in the abyss from which we may struggle to get out.
I feel the same.
I feel the same with the players who want to leave now its not looking good 🤔
It’s nice of players to give a shout-out to Maldini but that’s all it is. The loyalty has to be to the club and fans. They will get back to work as usual after the summer vacation, as their contracts require.
You are talking the players like robots without feeling and emotion attachment to someone like Maldini.
Theo would have never signed for 4M to extend his contract with Milan, had it not been Maldini as the mentor and point of reference;
Leao would have not extended his conctract with Milan, had it not been Maldini;
Now let’s see how Magnian is going to do with his contract extension with Cardinale in full control.
Why do you speak in absolutes? like YOU know what Theo and Leao would have done or not 🙂 it makes you look foolish.
we know, real fans know. unlike you
You AC Milan fans just want to be content with small wages when they get a big day elsewhere.
Wake up from ur disillusion.
God you really bring passion to the game.
PS This website doesn’t allow for apostrophes in usernames which is why there’s none between the Maldini AND S in my username but the S is important because it’s meant to be the possessive. Hope that helps clear things up.
Perfect
@Dejan 10 and @Poli are happy, what does it matter?
Everything is playing into the hand of the American business man. He will sell the stars for profit. Bookmark this comment. He is not interested in Milan.
Yep bookmarked under “drivel.”
Ha ha ha.
These “fans” that don’t like the owners keep pushing this erroneous agenda that the owners will sell our best players.
Even though 5 years of Elliott and now RedBird, Milan didn’t sell a single important player.
Shoo we barely sold any players because the man whose job was to sell players who were at least not needed couldn’t sell water to a thirty mam in the desert.
Buy the player, don’t use him, pay him and wait for his contract to expire.
They did sell players who were not needed. In the last 4 years, they sold them for total of €139m. The average is €35m per season.
Culture folks. Don’t ever let these suits try to tell us what our team stands for. These men took cuts on their wages to join us because he was involved. Prior to that we were signing Suso and Piatek. They worked like dogs for 3 years, because they didn’t give Maldini what he needed to do the job. The players aren’t dumb. They wanted to be part of a team with someone that was in their position in a management level and made financial sacrifices on their end to keep this team together. The management is showing clear signs they won’t. Game Over Cardinale and Redbird. You just f*cked up. Pack your sh*t and go back to where you came from
I think the fans need to protest #bringmaldiniback or #cardinale should swap with ( Berlusconi,) Monza, so he can do anything he likes
Why ultras did nothing, if u do protest and not buying the tickets, cardinale will listen and aware
Guys relax. Furlani will renew the contract for Mike no problem whatsoever.
Like he did renew leao contract with no problem
I have to agree about how even Ibra said and most importantly the fans! If you play for the legacy of Maldini then you don’t truly play for milan. You play for Maldini. This game isn’t about who is upstairs but who is on the pitch and in the stands you play to make your own stamp on a big club not ride the coattails of the past
These fans?
https://sempremilan.com/photo-fans-protest-maldini-casa-milan
This has nothing to do with Legacy of Maldini. It’s simply a matter of Ambition. Maldini resembled ambition. Maldini wants to win, so he brought these players for peanuts by convincing them with a project that involves winning. AND HE DELIVERED ON HIS PROMISES. Maldini is gone, aka the project is gone.. Cardinale nor the management has shown ANYTHING that resembles HALF a vision that involves winning. It only involves money. You think MONEY is what players like Theo, Leao, Maignan and Bennacer are here for? LOL
Well said!
True. Too much power for one individual. Are they playing for Maldini or fir Milan. The dust will settle and life will go on…time will tell if sacking Maldini was the right thing to do. I have confidence that Cardinale won’t let his 1.2bn investment go to ground. He knows better, and this is just redirecting things in his opinion. We will get thru this, the players are attached to Maldini but will eventually get back to business. Between Pioli, Cardinale and Furlani they will calm the players fears over the next couple of weeks. The best Cardinale can do is a statement signing or two…
I love Maldini dearly but i am not a Milan fan because of Maldini. I am also sympathetic to the way he was relieved of his duties but we never know what went on behind closed doors. This is time for us to ask the management y, like some fans already did. But no need to insults. Let’s watch as see how things progress. My allegiance is to Milan and I want to see Milan move forward. And I also know only one man cannot make this happen, either it be Candinale or Maldini. Forza Milan
I think what matters here is not people’s love for Maldini. It’s about the owner’s ambition. For the sake of Milan, I hope Cardinale succeeds in his endeavors and attempts. But so far, what every fan has seen..
1. Dude has NO passion for the sports nor the club. Cardinale wasn’t even present at the farewell of a club legend. I understand he can’t stand Maldini, but he owns Milan. He owed his presence to the fans. Elliot was present in every game.. Li was present in every game.. But not Cardinale? lol
2. His goals are VERY Shady. You cannot say he will do everything for the best of Milan. And at this point it’s evident. Why would you allocate just 50 mil to the summer when you had a prizemoney of 140 mil from UCL alone with too many holes in the Squad to fill.
3. If your allegiance is to Milan, why would you support the sacking of a SD who brought your beloved club from the brink of destruction with results on the pitch. I would understand if Cardinale actually showed that he cared about the club but he doesnt. His actions are very clear on that.
4. sacking someone as successful as Maldini should have a reason that’s a strong one. There is none. No Valid reason actually. Show me another Sporting Director who didn’t have failed signings. The reasons that we are seeing in news outlets are borderline pathetic. All of them basically saying Cardinale couldn’t win a single Di_ck measuring contest against Maldini in any of their meetings so he decided Maldini needs to go because our beloved Gerry was ashamed of his tiny pipi. Lol
Wrong time to be a Milan fan , you don’t treat a legend that way
Everyone who defends Cardinale is ridiculus.
He is an importer who destroy family from the inside. He thought that everybody will just accept fact that he fired the most loved person in the club? They signed contracts because of Maldini, he gives something special to this club and now we will change to some enterprise
Americans don’t understand European sport and they should just stay with their clown sports like baseball and worse rugby.
Redbird out
“Americans don’t understand European sport and they should just stay with their clown sports like baseball and worse rugby.”
Making assumptions based on one’s nationality is racist last time I checked.
Hopefully the players can grow up and understand this isn’t a hobby but rather a business.
They have all gotten too comfortable being in the overachieving underdog role. It’s hard to disappoint when no one has high expectations.
Those days are over. Cardinale wants trophies. Anything less will be unacceptable. If these players don’t care to win trophies then by all means please do leave.
Cardinale wants Trophies? LOL
Dude doesn’t even care enough to watch Milan games. lol It was Maldini who wanted trophies and he knew just a little bit of investment would do the trick. That’s what go Maldini fired. Cardinale wants nothing but money, even if it means selling every player we have.
I have to say the only bright spot today is the support from most Milan fans toward Maldini. I like your posts Milan4lyf, as I totally agree with you, amongst others.
It might be a business, but none of the tifosi chants praise money. Maldini embodied every Milan’s values, and now it seems like it’s gone with him, and we’re stuck with the banker. Now get ready for the auctions of our beloved players.
Agree with you brother.
Lol I get what you’re saying that “it’s a business”. So in that vein we can’t blame Maldini for not renewing Kessie, Dollar and Snake because after all it’s business. And Theo, Mike and co can make more money elsewhere because…well that’s business too. That sort of attitude only results in non-loyalty which is severely lacking in modern football and which Maldini was trying to cultivate back again. Most of the re-signed players can make much more elsewhere. You gotta ask yourself why they didn’t
Cardinale wants to use AC Milan’s history to promote his other businesses or, worse, to wash money. I hope I am wrong. But I don’t trust investment funds for something not-profitable like a football club. Also, Cardinale is not a boss there. He depends on his fund’s Board Members. And we’re doomed when they start cutting expenses because the only thing they do care about is numbers.
It is right for Maignan to ask questions, afterall it was Maldini who convinced him of the project. Now with Maldini gone, what next for the project? Players deserve to know.
Can’t wait to see who Poli brings in to replace arguably the best keeper in the world.
You know what’s so shady?
I’ve been monitoring the Milan Facebook page and official App the whole day to see the news.
0 mention? Absolutely nothing as if nothing’s happened. I’m sure Gerry instructed that to avoid the negative traffic he will receive!!
I always had a funny feeling about this guy, I always felt funny after every interview.
And I’m trying to look at this as objectively as I can, and can realize Maldini and Massara’s faults, yes! But which club has not signed flops from time to time ffs!! Which club? I tried to look at his perspective, the books, the field, the atmosphere, the culture, all angles and it’s it comes down to what many if you have highlighted! It’s personal!!
It’s a personal sacking.
Good luck to the next guy coming in, cause whatever Maldini lacked in ‘astute negotiations’ he certainly had an abundance of charm, and persuasion on players.
Dark day to be a Milan fan… this guy literally did what Boehly did🤷🏿♂️ctrl c and ctrl v. Look where that got a club that won champions league just yesterday.
Forza Milan
Forza Maldini
Forza Massara
Any True Milan fan would feel a gratitude towards Maldini for the entire resurgence of Milan. Cardinale knows no matter what story they run on the firing of Maldini, it ain’t gonna fly among the fans. I as a fan am not spending another dime for Cardinale till he comes up with an explanation for this and a plan for Milan to win Trophies. Otherwise, Cardinale can go F himself. I have a feeling Cardinale has neither. Wisdom and intelligence isn’t his thing it seems, specially when he thinks censoring players/official channels is the best way to go about it lol
Mike definitely affected with this news and i don’t expect he will renew after what these yankees did to Maldini.
I bet Leao, Tonali, Theo, Calabria, and other players are feeling the same. They just lost two legends in two days who inspired and gave them plenty of motivations to do better for Milan.
Cardinale made a big mistake 😡
Look I’m not here to say cardinals this and Maldini that. But I’m gonna be here regardless of this outcome. But if I owned a business or a club and I had someone telling me how to run it and he needs more money to sign people in a year in advanced. Even if you’re for CDK. They had damn near the same amount of minutes across all comps and Dybala has more contributions. Maldini had a good 5 years and brought a starting 11. but this last one made me lose faith in him as a director he wants to invest now but who he invest in takes years to develop. I personally think we need to go past that stage and bring in someone from the top 5 leagues. Kamala and lofts cheek are good signings. I don’t know the reasons behind the budget so I won’t support it until then or reject it either. I just hate to see another legend go right after the other as much as anyone but maybe investing in new upper management is also needed. I’m not against anyone here I’ll AWAIZ BE A MILANISTA. Regardless of what happens this summer. I’ll judge again when the winter comes
You know the CDK argument is a bait, right? Jerry the 1st, king of aholes just didn’t stand him because he dared ask for investment. Milan won’t be a football club anymore, it will be turned into the most profitable business. And we all know what it means.
The issue here is that we lost a competent manager, who brought star players with almost nothing, who made Milan a champion again, who was respected by every player and every fan. And there is so much disrespect in his firing. It’s disgusting. Vergogna!
Man City is most profitable business and that’s all it is – and guess what? They win because their business is functioning like it should. Stop your whining.
Are you trying to compare a Premier League club with its own stadium and unlimited funds from the most wealthy people in the world, with the ambition to display success and achievement in sports for political purpose, to a Serie A club owned by a guy who knows nothing about football, whose job is to please shareholders?
You can enjoy the situation right now at ease, but please don’t be patronizing to us who remember so well the pain from ten wasted years under poor guidance, while today we watch the values and a true legend of Milan fade away.
I’m not comparing anything – I guess your reading ability is pretty poor. You know nothing about Cardinale but you bitch constantly – I, on the other hand, look at this as a normal business move and good for the team. Wait and see what happens instead of crying. If any player wants to leave, I hope they do – if they are little kids that can’t handle structure change then they don’t belong here, regardless who they are. They get paid a lot of money to represent Milan, not Maldini. Not sure what’s so hard to understand. SMH
If I owned a club the first thing i’d do is to hire someone like Maldini and stay the f out of the way.
Most successful clubs in all sports have
Owners that hire the best people and stay out of the way and let them run it.
Cardinale wants to turn us into an Italian Arsenal that’s all. Make money first, win second.
CDK, Origi, not listening to Moncada all bs. He knew Maldini would stand for his bs so he fired him. This has been in the works for a while now, it wasn’t a spontaneous decision.
And just to show us fans that Cardinale don’t have respect to Milan, the history and the game, he has no balls in explaining to us the reason he sacked Maldini. I hope I’m wrong, but this guy has no passion for Milan and his actions is a recipee for disaster.
Maignan has every right to express his eventual disappointment and even disagreement with a board decision.
But that’s it, period. He’s no whinning child or a fvckin’ doom & gloom widow, and he won’t act on that kind of irrational outrage.
BTW: is this site a SERIOUS news portal dedicated to Milan or just another ludicrous ballyhoo outlet? Because I’m starting to think seriously that this is the second case.
No one is forcing you to read the comments.
AMEN @BB,. lol
Hey, admin. Your video can not be closed and it interferes our vision to the page even if we scroll. Could you kindly do something about it
Ikatan emosional pemain dengan klub itu penting , beberapa pemain menghormati Maldini dan bukan milan
All our big players will now he sold,as they have said,these American owners are here for business, we are about to become the Italian lille,a cash cow,I would all the fans would just boycot and not attend games all season long.
Cardinale want to win, he is not here to take profit by drawing money from Milan (like the Glazers draw dividend from Man Utd), he is here to enlarge his portfolio and asset by making Milan’s value greater and bigger and that require having stadium, winning team, and global brand (note that global brand cannot be achieved by becoming player sellers like RB Leipzic, etc)
The problem is he made 2 mistakes by firing Maldini:
First of all, indentifying players is Moncada’s job all along, not Maldini. Formulating the contract was Massara’s job, not Maldini. But who convince the players to join? Who convince them to sign for less? It was Maldini, his mere presence give stability to the team and draw players to Milan. Losing him is a big blow for team building.
Secondly, RedBird want to grow Milan by turning the Milan brand into a global brand. Maldini is the perfect brand ambassador. He is well known (worldwide) legend, synonimous to Milan. Firing him is not the right step to build a global brand.
“All our big players will now he sold,as they have said,these American owners are here for business, we are about to become the Italian lille,a cash cow,I would all the fans would just boycot and not attend games all season long.”
🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
It is a shocking indeed, the way they sack maldini.
But as time goes on, players and fans will move on.
Coach, staffs, players, they come and go.
I remember being so mad when Milan sold kaka, sheva, ibra, t33.
Nonetheless, i still support milan, because no matter how much i love the players, i still love milan the club, above them all.
Now i hape whoever is the new SD, will able to get great signings to show the team and the fans that Milan still want to win.
Very True my friend. I remember having the same anger when we sold Kaka. But in the end, Loyalty lies to the Club.
car buoght the wrong club
Listen guys, this is typical milan, fans ranting everywhere… players alike, we attach too much emotions, keep emotions and face business.
Things just got real guys, I LOVE THIS WITH ALL MY LIFE, now I know Cardinal means business.
Look, Bayern still won the German League, but sacked “legend” Oliver Khan (CEO) and their sporting director, why? Because, aside from the results, they analyse the process, now that is what has been missing at Milan.
Yes, we won the league, we got to the UCL semi final, but how did we achieve these? Did we get lucky or was it as a result of clear footballing identity? I let you answer that.
RECRUITMENT
With the signings of Thiaw, Dest, Kalulu, Tomori, Theo, Maignan – He proved his craft as a former defender in identifying defensive talents. But, with the lack of impact of Adli and Vranckx and other midfield and attacking signings except for Leao, Tonali, Giroud and Ibra, he has failed to make real signings to upgrade the team.
Look, the ownership that you all complaining about wanted to sign Dybala, but Maldini blocked it and said it doesn’t fit our sporting project, and instead signed CDK for 30m out of a 50m transferbudget, now why this deal which I feel was the real deal breaker, was a bitter pill for the ownership to swallow is this: research, reviews, statistics, data all proves that CDK’s strongest position is not AM, either you play him in the box or on the RW. But Maldini, in his stubbornness purchased him for AM.
A Cardinal who doesn’t want to upgrade the team wouldn’t push so hard for Dybala, and he was even cheaper, the deal was a no brainer, but Maldini had other ideas, so it is normal he faces the consequences.
Cardinal can see, each time we are on the pitch, he gets scared, because his 1.2billion investment is at stake, so let’s keep emotions aside, even fans who never generated any revenue for the club are online claiming to love the club more than someone who invested this much, do you think he will open his eyes and watch his investment go down the drain? You gotta think fellas,
All those milan in his DNA is what brought us here today, let people be assessed properly on the job and task given.
Now, what this means is that even Pioli isn’t safe, and rightly so. Even though we haven’t heard his job at risk, but I can tell you guys, he too is being assessed. We cannot always get lucky. Pioli gotta leave. We need a proper coach, we need proven quality players as well.
I have said this again and again, the best risk we can take right now is a risk on proven quality rather than unproven talents, thank God Cardinal feels same way too. Before Paolo, Milan was, and after Paolo, Milan is and will be. So stop being emotional, we don’t root for Paolo, we root for Milan, even Paolo knows this.
You are right at what you said the club is bigger than any individual but it’s the manner and the way things unfolded…..my point is there are ways to call it off not by keeping things hidden from players itself…the issue with bayern was it was on cards since they got knocked off champions league that changes will be made…..if you follow German press it was being mentioned that management changes are on cards….at milano it’s different they settle for meeting they decide sir you are off why because you messed up cdk what presumely we seeing in news….things should be clear and put out. Pioli tbh had his time at club after this season I don’t think he has that much tactical solutions to making things work out…he did alot for milan all these years but there comes a time when you do get exhausted and pioli tbh had hit that button…there is a power struggle paolo being rigid and owner being blunt. once again no individual is bigger than club and same goes for all including cardinale……
Well, I believe assessments and decisions should be made at the end of the season, especially knowing how fragile our team can be. Imagine making this kind of decision after the abysmal performance against Inter in the UCL, you can imagine the effect it will have on the team especially considering we were still fighting for UCL qualification. Overall, I think it was right to wait till the end of the season.
But I must say this, I expected Pioli to leave first though, but I don’t feel sorry for Maldini either, he should have done things differently.
And please, let’s not base it all on the CDK deal, the deal is just maybe the height, but the overall performance of the team suggested that certain decisions needed to be made.
@John the Baptist
“…research, reviews, statistics, data all proves that CDK’s strongest position is not AM, either you play him in the box or on the RW. But Maldini, in his stubbornness purchased him for AM.”
So, according to this asinine comment you wrote, Maldini bought CdK for AM and then told Pioli where to use him? Wow! He must have threatened Pioli on how to use CdK. Basically, Maldini was the coach, right?
Are you for real? First, you made a crap comparison with Bayern Munich sacking Oliver Kahn. Kahn sacked the Bayern coach, first. So, maybe Maldini should have sacked Pioli!
Bayern was in 3 competitions before Nagelsmann was sacked and replaced with Tuchel! Bayern barely won the league only because Borussia Dortmund bottled it on the last day. They lost the DFB Polka and got thrashed by Man City in UCL. So, Kahn deserved the boot, because you can argue that Nagelsmann’s sacking affected the team.
You guys are all pathetic with no loyalty. Fine, Cardinale ‘owns’ the club and he can do what he likes with it, but please don’t come and spew arrant nonsense because you don’t like Maldini.
Now, that’s the point, you rightly hit it on the head. Maldini should have sacked Pioli. Pioli knew CDK isn’t built for AM but deliberately played him there for all to see the inexperience of Maldini, at the end he played him on the right, I believe he proved a point to other members of management with his trial at AM.
Assimilate properly before you reply to my comments, I don’t entertain dumb conversations. You highlighted the process through which Bayern won the league. But if it was at Milan, we would celebrate the result and forget.
Bayern won because Borussia Dortmund gifted it, now back home how did we win the league? Agreed, Bayern got lucky, but was your darling club lucky? We have all forgotten.
Remember how our journey started in UCL? UCL playoff against small Rio Ave? They missed like 4 penalties in the shoot out and we went through (I almost died of heart attack that night), remember how we signed Hauge? How he bossed our defence against Bodo/Limit?
We won the Scudetto because of similar reasons Bayern won the league. Are you proud the way we got dumped out of the cup by Torino?
Inter dumped us out of the UCL by a respectable scoreline, it could easily have been a whooping 6-0 scoreline, are you proud of that?
I mean, something had to be done, I honestly didn’t Maldini to be the first sincerely, I expected Pioli, but since Maldini didn’t see it, it’s right he pays the price.
Relax, this move will everyone more serious at their job, the shake was needed AF.
No thank you, not going through another banter era, definitively not sticking around to watch Cardinale throw away this perfect opportunity to push to the next level. Good luck and enjoy your depression.
Yeah… up Inter?
How about that for a start
Well said @John the Baptist. Milan comes first, the dust will settle and we will carry on. Cardinale is not stupid enough to let his ego get in the way and put his 1.2bn investment at risk. Lets hope for clear signals from management over the next couple of weeks and then we can judge them when the season resumes.
Sacking Maldini was a very big mistake, very big one. I will keep on repeating it even if there are people that don’t want to hear it.
Simple thing to do was to promote Maldini to another position if you don’t want him to be the technical director and make Masara the technical director or employ someone else.
Zanetti that’s Inter’s vice president doesn’t have an extra head.
For real I hope this Cardile man doesn’t take us back to where we were coming from, I just pray it doesn’t happen because I have already seen that the fans are already divided, when the numbers starts reducing at San Siro then that I when we will all know that this got to us.