MFO’s Managing Director Carmine Villani, who was involved in Investcorp’s talks to acquire Milan in 2022, now reveals the Rossoneri would have had a €300m-400m transfer budget if the Bahrain-based fund had closed the deal.
Gerry Cardinale’s RebBird Capital Partners acquired a majority stake in the Rossoneri in August from Elliott for €1.2b. The previous owners partially financed the acquisition through a ‘vendor loan’ and kept a minority stake in the club.
Bahrain-based fund Investcorp had previously approached Elliott, trying to acquire the Serie A giants, but eventually abandoned talks after several weeks of negotiations that had seen Carmine Villani’s MFO involved as Investcorp’s partner.
“I can’t discuss the details, but I can confirm that our group was ready to acquire a majority stake in Milan and grant €300m-400m for transfers to bring the club back to the top of European football as their history deserves,” Villani told Repubblica.
“If Elliott wanted, we would have let them keep a minority stake in the club.”
Milan’s transfer strategies haven’t changed with Cardinale at the helm of the club. The Rossoneri still have a low transfer budget and could only spend €50m last summer. It is believed that director Paolo Maldini will have to deal with similar figures during the next transfer window.
Yes and if I took over the club, I’d have invested 1 trillion euro in transfers….! Easy to talk when it’s all hypothetical. And even more funny that he has decided to talk conveniently at a moment when Milan have some bad results.
We still don’t want your money, get over it.
Not a very smart club at all. They sold to Yonghong Li and got duped and this bird ain’t laying any eggs. Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me.