Milan director Paolo Maldini is looking to renew winger Rafael Leao’s contract without changing the club’s transfer strategy, according to reports in Italy.
The Portugal international was named Serie A MVP and was pivotal to the Rossoneri’s Scudetto success with key goals throughout the campaign.
However, Real Madrid are reportedly interested in Leao’s signature, having missed out on the opportunity to sign Kylian Mbappe from Paris Saint-Germain.
And Gazzetta dello Sport report Milan are looking to extend the 22-year-old’s signature without breaking their transfer structure.
According to the report, this new deal would see Leao triple his wages to €4.5 million per year.
While it does state that Leao would be happy to extend, the report adds that his agent, Jorge Mendes, would prefer he join a club with a bigger budget. Leao’s current contract expires in 2024.
In 34 Serie A appearances last season, he scored 11 goals and contributed 10 assists.
As well as Leao, Milan are working on extending defender Fikayo Tomori’s contract as well as others.
#Leao – Milan, la trattativa per il rinnovo entra nel vivo. Pronta l'offerta per vincere le tentazioni spagnole https://t.co/IxmoZUpbbh
— La Gazzetta dello Sport (@Gazzetta_it) June 6, 2022
We can afford 7,5 for Zlatan but not for Leao? Increase the offer, he’s indispensable.
Leao deserve at least 7M a year salary if Zlatan earn 7M
Zlatan its different player bro.. next season he wont earn 7m/ year for this. They have wage structure who must be respected. I guess, leao accept 4.5m/ year or being sold.
As at the 20th to 25th match of the season LEAO is not showing this performance, great performances afterwards no doubt, so we are going to pay him 7M? just like we paid Gigio 6M and after 4 years he wants 12, CHALA want 5 and KESSIE wants 8.
If you pay him 7 now, what are you going to pay THEO, TOMORI and others when you are negotiating their renewal ? 3-4M ? when their agents knew they can earn double else where ?
“While it does state that Leao would be happy to extend, the report adds that his agent, Jorge Mendes, would prefer he join a club with a bigger budget”
This is bunch of nonsense – if the player wants to extend, he should extend, not let his agent decide. Look at what happened to Donnarumma! Agents are the real problem in today’s world but the players are also at fault for letting them ruin their careers.
I don’t think Milan plan to keep a hold of him past ’26/27. If they get a deal done now, they will plan to cash in on him during next renewal window. Hope they do too – He’d be worth his weight in gold. I do think that 5-6mil isn’t outrageous for him, given his contributions.
They can’t offer him more than that. It’s not right when Theo has just extended for around 4m a season. You ruin everything by offering one player much more than everybody else. Now Leao was instrumental but so was Theo and even Tonali, Tomori and Maignan, and they earn much less.
Maldini knows what he’s doing.
This is fair. Maybe offer to help pay his fee to sporting too but extend to 2029