Paolo Maldini admits Sven Botman was Milan‘s priority target in the summer and notes how the Rossoneri have ‘less budget than the last Premier League club.’
The Serie A giants had reached a verbal agreement with the Dutch defender in February but did not match Newcastle’s offer in the summer, seeing the 22-year-old move to St. James’ Park.
The Serie A giants operated with a limited budget and could only make one big-money transfer in the summer.
Milan owners opted to invest in a new attacking midfielder rather than a centre-back especially considering that the Rossoneri had the less beaten defence in Europe’s top five leagues in the first part of 2022.
They eventually signed Charles De Ketelaere from Club Brugge for €32m.
“To tell the truth, we tried to sign Botman. Had we signed him, we would have gotten an attacking midfielder on loan,” Maldini told Gazzetta.
“The idea was not to sign average footballers and sign exciting prospects. Charles is among them. We must wait for him, but don’t have many doubts.”
Gerry Cardinale’s RedBird Capital Partners completed Milan’s takeover last month, but the Rossoneri’s transfer budget won’t increase short-term, continuing on a sustainable path.
“Gerry has energy and is a listener, and I like this. The idea is to continue on Elliott’s path and then grow and go towards bigger targets,” said Maldini.
“We won’t go beyond the economic limits we have. We have to increase incomes and the wage bill.
“Incomes have improved over the last three years, so now we must invest. The project includes economic efforts depending on revenues and the time has come, with graduality, to respect the project.
“We won’t do anything that is not in our financial capacity. The last Premier League team has more budget than us, we have history and ideas.”
Milan and Inter are going through a ‘public debate’ to build a new stadium in the area of San Siro and have reportedly decided to demolish the Stadio Meazza.
“Sharing the stadium is not a problem,” said Maldini. “San Siro is full of memories. But the question is, do we want to live with memories or create something new?”
Read more: Maldini insists Leao wants to stay at Milan.
it’s called turning your weakness into strength… grande Maldini