What should have been done in the summer:
- Sell Dumfries (there was interest at around 35m)
- Sell De Vrij (at any cost since we had alienated relations with him and he was mentally done on the pitch, something like 12m could have been achieved)
- Sell Pinamonti (done - ish)
- Sell Sensi (I was in favor of keeping him but the coach and management don't trust him. Loan is not good enough but at least get the option if Monza doesn't get relegated. Capital gains was an issue so it'll be easier next season)
- Do not pay Sanchez to leave. Let his contract expire.
- Sign Dybala. No brainer.
- Sign Bremer. No brainer.
- Do not go for Lukaku. Waste of money. The operation costs us 30m. Money that could have been spent on something that's not a 1 year loan deal. Advise to management: Do not reheat your old food, it never tastes the same.
- Do not sign Mkhtaryan. No complaints about the guy's work ethic but there's no point.
- Sell Gagliardini. (Some interest from Fiorentina, Lazio, Monza and a few others was there, but can't tell if we could have gotten a decent fee around the capital gains threshold)
- Not sign Bellanova. He was not ready. Or if we did sign him, send him on loan to a team like Fiorentina or Udinese who can groom him and he'd get familiar with a higher level than Cagliari.
- Not lose Perisic on a free!
What was not possible:
- Sell Correa
- Sell Dzeko
We had a few offers but both players rejected to leave.
It was also not possible to sell Brozovic as he had just signed the new deal.
Not sure where Gosens would stand in this scenario, but I guess we could have loaned him out to Bundesliga or sold him to a PL club if that was our intention. I'm pretty sure Tottenham would have been interested for example, as they'd not have Perisic in this scenario.
Instead we tried to sell Bastoni. He seems lost now.
We tried to sell Skriniar. He seems pissed now. Contract is still expiring.
We considered selling Barella. Didn't get to the point of receiving offers iirc but Real Madrid and Liverpool were heavily interested in case we were. And we had named the price.
Now obviously this isn't easy as you get on a video game, but we allegedly have the best sporting director in Italy and one of the best in Europe, but the job he's done ever since the pandemic hit has been close to atrocious and the excuse of having shitty owners should be fading. He opted for the easy way out, which the players
themselves didn't approve of and we ended up with the worst possible scenario. All this while spending record fees in the previous season (2019-20 which includes the winter market where Eriksen arrived).
If we did this, we'd have the funds Suning asked for, we'd have a team that has less weaknesses and we'd just need to fill up 2 roster spots with limited funds. Under Sabatini we managed to get players on both these spots on a loan + option deal. Sure our reputation is lower now since we rarely take those on, but we could have found a right wing back on such a deal as well as a Sensi/Gagliardini replacement. Napoli managed to find a gem in Anguissa from Fulham this way, it's not as if we don't know a bunch of players to pick from, we just don't go for it.
So the management:
- Missed out on our main targets, spectacularly I might add.
- Failed to secure money from sales.
- Didn't reinforce the team in any way and did not replace in any way two significant losses in Perisic and Sanchez.
Small problem was that there were no official offer for Dumfries? Only for Skriniar and Bastoni got real offers with decent money. Also if Dumfries have good world cup we might get more than 35m? I’m all for selling him if good offer arrives and I hoped for that offer to come in last summer?
I also think De Vrij wants to go bosman next summer, that way he can get more money for himself. So even if we would have gotten that offer for ~12m (witch we did not), I think De Vrij would have turned it down like Dzeko did?
Clearly we did not get decent offer for Sensi other wise we would have sold him.
We payed for Sanchez and Vidal to leave, but still we saved few millions for doing so. We got Mkhitaryan for depth for lesser wage than Vidal. Lukaku replaced Sanchez and clearly Lukaku is better than Sanchez. Of course he is injured now, but on paper he is huge upgrade.
Bellanova is interesting player and he is on loan, so I don’t think we can loan him elswhere?
I really like Asllani and he seems to be really promising. Great transfer from our managment and good scouting! We need more of these kind of deals! Great to see we have good backup for Brozo!
Acerbi is free loan and he gave up two months of his wages to get this deal done. I think he has been solid and I don’t mind of players age if they perform. This was best we could pull off at current finances and we made 140m losses. This was also Simone request.
Bremer, Milenkovic, Akanji… would have happened if we would got good offer for Skriniar early, but PSG did not offer what was needed/wanted, so we could not make a move for any of those players. I also think it’s pretty normal that great players get good offers and sometimes that might mess up their heads, but I always hope they do their jobs and be professionals? But with our current finances we need to listen every offer and what players want? I think players should also know of our financial situation, so this should not be any surprise to them?
I still hope Skriniar extends and get his shit together? But if he wants to go, then so be it.
We managed to sell Pinamonti and Casadei for ~40m, not bad! We also got 7,5m from Di Gregorio and Gravillon.
We might also get 5m from Pirola after 20 games (obligation), Sensi 10m, Esposito 10m, Lazaro 5m so that would be 30m, but I think maybe only Esposito and maybe Sensi will be sold, but that will be close to what Suning wanted? We might also get something for likes of F. Carboni, Salcedo, Vanhausden, Radu next summer, or use them as depth. So it seem Marotta did not take the easy way this summer?
I was against Lukaku loan as Dybala was free. For me it seems that Zhang and Inzaghi wanted Lukaku more than Dybala? Zhang even presented Lukaku comeback in the summer and it seems like Zhang is big Lukaku fan? I think Marotta like more of Dybala as he got Dybala to Juve back in the day, but Zhang had upper hand on this one. This is of course pure speculation. Also Lula duo was good under Conte so, I get the idea… Also I have never seen this crazy deal for player to be sold over 100m and after a year get him back on loan
To lose Perisic was a big mistake, but I think the idea was to cut some wages for not renew him with high salary and I think managment thought Gosens would be natural replacement for him, as did I? It seems Simone do not rate Gosens and maybe he will be sold next summer? I just hope he would get few games a row and show what he can do?
Coach is our biggest problem, with finance. I hope we can fix our coach problem if Suning decides to use/inject that 100m from those loans? For going forward we still have good players and great assets who we can sell and get fresh blood in and world cup might be good thing for us? I don’t mind us for selling players, if we get good offers.
Also we can lower our wages/costs as Dzeko, Gags, De Vrij, Danilo, Darmian, Dalbert, Acerbi, Handa might leave next summer. Also Lukaku and Skriniar futures need to be solved.
There are interesting free agents again next summer and I have some hopes that some of our young players might come good? Lautaro, Satriano, Barella, Asllani, Carboni, Agoume, Dumfries, Bellanova, Zanotti, Dimarco, Bastoni, Fontanarosa, Onana, Brazao are 26 or under. Correa, Hakan, Brozovic, Gosens, Skriniar all are under 30. That leaves Mkhitaryan, Danilo (might extend), Darmian (might extend) over 30. So with few loan deals and free agents we can still have one of the best squads in Serie A, with limited budget.
Antonello also needs to find us a new main sponsor and I hope new stadium will be solved end of next year? If that happens we will improve our finances and might find a new owner? That might also mean that our managment get sacked? I don’t mind that if we just get good people to replace them?
Sorry for long ass post! But I just don’t see everything as negative. Sure sporting results are not great now, but it might change if we find capable coach? My wish would be Bielsa as he has done good job with younger players and I think he would suit to Inter for 2-3 years. He is also flexible with his tactics and is used to operate with a limited founds.