Pippo Inzaghi was so desperate to leave Juventus for Milan that he took a massive pay cut, revealed Adriano Galliani. ‘He earned less with us, but won the Champions League and Club World Cup.’
The striker has released his new autobiography and many figures from the football world were present at the presentation of the book this evening.
They included current Monza CEO Galliani, who was Silvio Berlusconi’s right hand man at Milan for over 30 years and in charge of those negotiations in the summer of 2001.
“There were 10 million dividing us from Juventus, who wanted us to increase our offer,” confessed Galliani.
“At that point, Inzaghi gave up on that 10 million just so he could come to Milan. He earned less with us than he would’ve done in Turin, but on the other hand he had the good fortune with us to win the World Cup, the Champions League and the Club World Cup.”
SuperPippo remained with Milan until his retirement in 2012 and won the Champions League in 2003 on a penalty shoot-out against Juventus at Old Trafford.
The decisive spot-kick was converted by Andriy Shevchenko.
“The biggest scare of my football life was when Sheva stepped up in 2003 and I saw Pippo just flat out on the ground. He would’ve been the sixth in line for the penalty if it had gone to sudden death,” added Galliani.
“I always loved Pippo, as there might’ve been players who were more technically gifted, but nobody had his goal-scoring instinct.”
Inzaghi scored 126 goals in 300 competitive matches for the Rossoneri.
He also found the net 25 times in 57 senior caps for Italy, lifting the 2006 World Cup with Marcello Lippi’s side.