Mercato Rossonero: Milan Transfer Activity Inside Out

M99 wrote:My dreams come a little too late. Ronaldinho was my dream signing in 2002. Torres was my dream signing in 2006.

Torres was my fave youngster in Pes back when he was at Atletico

you can see how excited i am now that he joins Milan , i am so totes excited i feel like crying

My prophetic dreams which end up cursing Milan. Can picture the rage five years later when Milan signs a 32 year old, 250 kg, injury prone Messi

Dante wrote:

M99 wrote:My dreams come a little too late. Ronaldinho was my dream signing in 2002. Torres was my dream signing in 2006.

Torres was my fave youngster in Pes back when he was at Atletico

you can see how excited i am now that he joins Milan , i am so totes excited i feel like crying

he was my favourite player too. when demetrio albertini went to atletico, and i remember some news saying that altletico owned some money to us on loan deal. and we really tried to get him at milan. dont know how true it was but, torres was a tremendous talent back then. wasnt he the youngest captain ever for atletico?



so torres just said this today...


Torres: "Albertini has also told me good things about Milan. He is a good friend of mine."




Torres: "I was close to joining Milan when I played for Atlético Madrid, but that was a long time ago."



so the rumours i had read and heard about like 2004-2005 was indeed true.


he really was close to joiining milan and that was because atletico owned some money to milan for demetrio albertini loan deal and we asked fernando torres instead but aletico were very very reluctant to let torres go

Just so you guys know.

MVG would walk into your midfield at present. He is a great B2B player who can do it all.

He'd also fit in nicely with everyone fully fit.
Monto De Jong Van Ginkel would be a quality midfield.

As for Torres, I don't think it's all bad. While he isn't the player he once was, he is still capable. He may turn over a new leaf in serie A and get some confidence back.

He is very good at creating goals for others, too. So I think Menez and ES would benefit from him playing. He is also great at scoring against scurbs, so any relegation fodder should beware.
He doesn't have the pace he once did but he is not slow and will not stop running for the team. Another thing which often goes overlooked is his presence in the dressing room, he brings quite a lot of our team together and I don't think he'll have any problems fitting in. He would probably help the form of Lopez as well since they're both Spanish.

On the downside, he often misses easy chances, makes silly mistakes while dribbling and is the wrong side of 30 now.

You guys could do worse, though.

Also, I should add, the main reason for us wanting Torres out is that he doesn't fit our system.

With our three creative players behind our CF, all we need our Cf's to do is put the ball in the back of the net, something which Torres isn't great at, something with Costa (and hopefully soon, Destro) excels at.

While Milan lack the creative players behind him (Only Honda fits that description), Torres could well be a creative type CF for Milan, allowing Menez and ES to score lots.

Dont lie to them Kick

What part is a lie?

Kick wrote:With our three creative players behind our CF, all we need our Cf's to do is put the ball in the back of the net, something which Torres isn't great at, something with Costa (and hopefully soon, Destro) excels at.

Unless you're playing a false 9 formation, in what universe is a forward who cant put the ball in the back of the net worth anything?

If you want honest feedback on Torres (and you're feeling brave) go read the "official dump on Torres thread" in the Chelsea section

fatman123 wrote:

Kick wrote:With our three creative players behind our CF, all we need our Cf's to do is put the ball in the back of the net, something which Torres isn't great at, something with Costa (and hopefully soon, Destro) excels at.

Unless you're playing a false 9 formation, in what universe is a forward who cant put the ball in the back of the net worth anything?

Ask Southampton why they bought Long then

In all seriousness, I was trying to give my opinion on what Torres actually has going for him, since all Chelsea fans do it put him down, despite him not being as bad as we make him out to be.

Its the job of a CF to score goals, end of story.

In the begining when we had a midfeild of Lampard, Essien, Ramires etc it was fair to say that he wasnt getting the service he needed to score. But now when hes had the likes of Hazard, Mata, Oscar and Cesc supporting him he still hasnt imporved despite having more service then most forwards in Europe, any forward who cant thrive in that environment isnt worth anything.

Going to Milan may well spark him back to life, but if he keeps playing at the level hes shown for that last few seasons then he isnt going to bring nearly as much to the table as Balotelli did, especially in a side whose main creative outlet is Honda (all due respect to him, I think hes a great player, but hes not on the level of Oscar/Mata)

Wait until we pay a ridiculous fee for him too.

Ok, i've mulled this over and calmed down. While Torres is not the replacement i wanted, he will have to do. Regardless, Milan have a history of revitalizing players, hopefully Torres will show up for us.

We also have a history of signing utter hacks who we then can't sell because no one wants them and no one else would be stupid enough to pay them half of their wage.

Torres' general play, as mentioned, is quite decent, however we're going to be highly dependent upon getting contributions across the whole forward line. If Torres, Pazzini, Honda, Menez and Niang can all chip in, El Shaarawy is capable of picking up the slack, we're just going to have to ensure we're defensively solid and try to avoid our usual injury crisis.

2 days until the transfer window closes and this team is lacking in every department.

dostoevsky wrote:We also have a history of signing utter hacks who we then can't sell because no one wants them and no one else would be stupid enough to pay them half of their wage.

Torres' general play, as mentioned, is quite decent, however we're going to be highly dependent upon getting contributions across the whole forward line. If Torres, Pazzini, Honda, Menez and Niang can all chip in, El Shaarawy is capable of picking up the slack, we're just going to have to ensure we're defensively solid and try to avoid our usual injury crisis.

I would agree with that, but aside from signing Jackson Martinez, you would have had to regardless of your target.

The other thing worth mentioning is that Torres is a brand. He still sells a lot of shirts and does pull an audience.

Could well bring some more money to the club.

Martinez was not the only 20+ goal forward on the market, particularly given that we've had three months to consider our options.

I am not suggesting that it would be ideal to become dependent upon a star forward, however whilst we have diversity, there are question marks over the reliability of every single member of our forward line, El Shaarawy aside when fit. When you compare that to the depth and talent boasted by Roma and Napoli, it's a poor showing.

In that respect, I agree. If you didn't plan to sell Balo, then it's different. (From what I understand, he was gone all summer)

fatman123 wrote:Its the job of a CF to score goals, end of story.

In the begining when we had a midfeild of Lampard, Essien, Ramires etc it was fair to say that he wasnt getting the service he needed to score. But now when hes had the likes of Hazard, Mata, Oscar and Cesc supporting him he still hasnt imporved despite having more service then most forwards in Europe, any forward who cant thrive in that environment isnt worth anything.

Going to Milan may well spark him back to life, but if he keeps playing at the level hes shown for that last few seasons then he isnt going to bring nearly as much to the table as Balotelli did, especially in a side whose main creative outlet is Honda (all due respect to him, I think hes a great player, but hes not on the level of Oscar/Mata)

Torres hasn't been clinical in years , something i believe we all understand quite well. The thing is , we don't have anyone better either
Pazzini as much as i don't like this , months after his comeback from that injury , he hasn't been nowhere near the same player. Even at his best , we're going nowhere with Pazzini as our main man up front , that's why we got Balotelli in the first place . I'd take Torres to spearhead our attacks instead , even a 30 year old washed up Torres is better than Pazzini will ever be.

There's also Menez , who could play false 9 , though i doubt that's going to work well , or regularly.. It could work against some teams , in some matches ; but Menez "9" isn't something anyone wants Milan to build on. So again , i'd take Torres and all his faults to that .

Then there's Niango Unchained , which in comparison to Torres , Torres seems like Shevchenko in my eyes. Any day of the millenium i'd choose Torres, instead of having to see Niango play CF and split my mind apart.

As for the support he's going to have in Milan , it won't be easy for him . Certainly not better than what he had at Chelsea. Honda and Poli will hardly prove the same quality like the dudes at Chelsea. Other than that , it's all quite different . Serie A is weaker these days , i think within a decent enough Milan , Torres won't manage worse than Balotelli , that's my hope at least. If we do get a midfielder and a winger in addition to Torres , i think Torres could even do well if he's able .

Torres is certainly not an ideal replacement for our attack, but easily the best among our current strikers , which says a lot .. And other than that , from every single other option available at this time , not sure how this sounds , but i would still take Torres. Soldado? pls. J-Martinez? 35m? gtfo. Mitroglou? nope. Destro? Probably the only one i would take instead , but Milan actually tried and it didn't happen. Roma either wants too much to sell to another Italian club or won't sell to one at all.

dostoevsky wrote:Martinez was not the only 20+ goal forward on the market, particularly given that we've had three months to consider our options.

I am not suggesting that it would be ideal to become dependent upon a star forward, however whilst we have diversity, there are question marks over the reliability of every single member of our forward line, El Shaarawy aside when fit. When you compare that to the depth and talent boasted by Roma and Napoli, it's a poor showing.

I agree about the abundance of time we have had to look for better replacements , no arguing there , but other than that ; 20+ goal forwards ( even if i don't like this term or standard or whatever it seems to be ) need a 20+ assist team behind them. We don't necessarily have the means to make him produce like that.

Martinez may do his thing in Porto , but i am almost certain , he'd barely do any better than Balotelli in Milan . On top of that he's overpriced and that would mean no midfielder or winger , if we had spent that much. What could happen in the future with J-M, in case we strengthened.. that's another matter . In that case , he should be "worth it".. but that's not so helpful right now , knowing we would never pay that money for Martinez.

Anyhow , i don't think for a second Martinez would produce the same in Italy . And when you look at his price .. i don't know. With that money , we will probably get a midfielder in addition to the striker and also , maybe , if we are lucky , a winger. I'd take this situation instead of an overpriced Jackson , if i want to be honest.

Agreed on the need for reliable assist makers within the team to support any centre forward who arrives, I'd much rather invest money in an additional creative force and grab any old cheap centre forward.

Much comes down to the structure of our attacking play in general however. Simply having a player whose specialty it is to provide the final pass will not in itself solve the situation. We've lacked coherence in building attacks for a while now, with no clear strategy evolving over time. Possession has never been an issue for our side, in fact we excel in this area, however whilst we have had games where everything clicks, quite often our possession in the final third has been either aimless or hurried. Whilst Poli had an interrupted season last year, his presence was important at times to add a midfielder capable of both starting moves from deep and then moving beyond the ball to find space. Our movement in the final third and composure under pressure have been severely lacking and it is a structural issue in our play as much as one of personnel. We will not dramatically improve without bringing in players of greater technical ability and a greater appreciation of space, however it's imperative that Inzaghi brings about a greater sense of purpose in attack. Too often we've watched games where our players seem to have no idea what the game plan is and to subsequently panic during crucial moments when our backs are to the wall.

Whoever comes, Inzaghi has to help them succeed, we can't simply let the players "express themselves" in attack, we lack a leader in attack to direct play. I think Inzaghi's use of our fullbacks this year and a tucked in role for Honda may prove influential in his plans to address this issue, but we'll see.

Also it appears Van Ginkel has been encouraged to come to Milan by Mourinho. There are reports of a fee of 500,000 euros for a season long loan, with this fee decreasing if he makes more than 20 appearances to give us an incentive to develop him.

If we get Van Ginkel without an option to buy that is disgraceful.

Whilst it is far from ideal, I do believe we need a midfield addition and I would prefer to have the services of a useful player for a year even if we do not enjoy the long term benefits of his development than ignoring the position entirely. The alternatives we apparently approached throughout the summer rarely filled me with joy.

Whilst I'm not exactly happy with the idea of a straight loan, the phrase beggars can't be choosers has never been more appropriate. We've barely spent a cent this summer - though we're probably still paying installments on 20 players this season - and as far as cheap options go, this seems tactically sensible.

Oh, yeah it would be a fine deal... if we were Reggina and not a Serie A club owned by a billionaire.

There's no way we'd like you have an option to buy on this loan.

To be fair, I think this loan benefits both parties.