Rude Awakening

It was 6am and I awoke reluctantly. I started to check Twitter to see if anything interesting had happened in the few hours that I had been asleep. At first I thought I must still be asleep. But I kept reading and everywhere was reporting the same thing. That Milan had reached an agreement with the newly relegated Sunderland to bring Fabio Borini to Milan for about €5m. Talk about a rude awakening.

It honestly would have made more sense to sign this Fabio

I don’t know if anyone remembers Borini. Personally, I had forgotten he was even still alive. Especially since his singular senior national team cap was five years ago now. He and Destro were hot young up and coming stars like six years ago or so. Stars that never shone. And we already got our turn with Destro, who is now Bologna’s impact number 10. As Borini has already landed in Milan to take his medicals, I am reading that in the last five seasons, our new star striker has scored 16 goals in league competitions at his various clubs. Total. In comparison, our new left back, a defender, Ricardo Rodriguez, has scored 15 goals during the same time frame, and all for one club. That is a… well… not what you would call a quality striker.

This massive digression from our virtually dream mercato to date was so sudden and unexpected. But it was followed up with the news that they are giving Paletta to Torino for either free or up to €500.000 and sending Poli to Bologna on a free transfer. Also that they are looking to sell Lapadula, he’s being offered to Genoa. So it’s definitely real. We had to know there would be some head-scratchers or unpopular decisions coming, but this really caught me off guard. Like if Galliani somehow got the new passwords or something.

His very brief 15 minutes of fame

Ironically, it came the day after all of the paperwork and approvals were completed for the league to approve the sale of Milan to Yonghong Li. The new board met and ratified everything necessary, and Milan are officially able to compete in both the league and the Europa League this season. So did Fassone and Mirabelli decide that they had done enough to impress and now that Milan is legit, they can just do whatever they want? I get that there is a budget to meet and we can’t have it all immediately. But even Borini seems to be in disbelief and just hopeful to sign the contract before they come to their senses.

Gratefully, in addition to Borini’s medicals (please don’t pass them, please don’t pass them,) Conti has confirmed a meeting with Milan for tomorrow. Rumors of Calhanoglu still persist. And the neverending Donnarumma renewal saga is rumored to come to an end with meetings no later than Friday between Raiola and the club and likely the player himself this time, too. With the team returning to Milanello on Monday, we are actually in better shape than we have been in many years to start our season. Which is good because with a friendly in Switzerland with Lugano on the 11th and the trip to China beginning on July 14th, the same day as we find out our Europa League qualifying fate, it will be a big help for Montella to know what he will be working with.

Borini is very familiar with poor decisions

But no matter how many good things have happened so far this summer, one question still persists: Why Borini? Why spend actual money to buy a player that weakens a bench that was already weak to compete in three competitions? If they can sell Lapadula for what they want, then they will come out ahead financially on the transfers. But the team will be much worse for the deal. So why? Other than perhaps to emphasize the results of taking chances on young players who never fulfill their potential? But that seems like a pretty big price to pay for a lesson like that. After so much good news in such a short period of time, this probable deal with Borini is a very rude awakening.

This post inspired by the music of The Last of the Shadow Puppets’ “My Mistakes Were Made For You”

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