It’s not exactly Michael Corleone who flew across the Atlantic and landed in Sicily to settle family affairs, but he’s not far from it either. The first man of the Red Bird Capital Partners investment fund and AC Milan landed on Monday in the capital of fashion and participated in the “Cincoro Tequila” gala event, where he chatted with legendary tennis player Serena Williams and rapper Travis Scott, and then did a couple of “familiar” errands. The main reason for Gerry Cardinale’s arrival was a large round table where he spoke with club directors Geoffrey Moncada and Giorgio Furlani, president Paolo Scaroni and special advisor Zlatan Ibrahimovic. For six hours, this five talked about AC Milan’s moves in the transfer window, and one of the points concerned the arrival of Youssouf Fofana at San Siro.Men’s Olympic football tournament – no Brazil and no big namesMonaco dragged the deal for weeks, demanded the entire 30,000,000 euros for a player whose contract expires in a year, and then a scenario that could be characterized as “one call changes everything” happened. After new talks with the people from Monaco, Cardinale negotiated Fofana’s arrival for 14,000,000 euros fixed compensation and several million more in bonuses. The agreement on the amount of that potential bonus is practically the only detail that separates the transfer from the realization.##NAJAVA_MECA_8228732##Gerald “Gerry” Cardinale, landed unannounced in Milan and gathered his managers to look not only at the market, but also at all strategic activities of the club, from brand development, through stadium and sports policy. In a few days, the aforementioned businessman will welcome the management, coach and team in New York, on the occasion of the arrival of the seven-time European champion on a tour of America. It is clear that yesterday’s summit with Ibrahimovic, Scaroni, general director Furlani and sports director Moncada gave a significant impetus to move much harder on the market than before, especially in the negotiations with Monaco for the midfielder of the French national team Youssouf Fofana.##EDITORS_CHOICE##The two parties met in recent days to discuss the deal, yesterday they had a new phone contact and brought the deal closer to a successful conclusion. New talks are expected today because the goal is to close the operation, including the signatures on the contracts, in the next 48 to 72 hours, that is, until AC Milan’s departure to the USA for the pre-season tour. There is an agreement on the fixed part at 14,000,000 euros, and it remains to be discussed about the variable part, that is, about the amount of bonuses and the conditions under which they would be activated. Rumors about the involvement of Manchester United and Atlético Madrid in the race for Fofana apparently pushed Cardinale to make a decisive move in order not to risk losing an extremely high-quality, but not too expensive player who entered the last year of his contract with the Dukes. The Frenchman, originally from Mali and Ivory Coast, has been showing enthusiasm to make himself available to Paulo Fonseca for some time now.Milan are hoping to close a deal with Monaco for Youssouf Fofana within the next 2-3 days. There will be a new meeting today.The two sides have pretty much agreed to a transfer fee of €14M. Now the sides are working on the bonuses. Fofana will sign a 4-year contract with… pic.twitter.com/GOoI4g3Ray— Raffaele (@ItalianoCalcio) July 23, 2024 Fofana will sign a four-year contract, not a five-year contract as thought at the beginning of this transfer story. A guy born in 1999 will double his salary, which is currently slightly higher than 1,200,000 euros, and from now on he will earn from 2,500,000 to 3,000,000 per year, depending on the fulfillment of bonuses. After being called up to the national team for the European Championship and being part of Deschamps’ team that reached the semi-finals of the continental tournament (making three appearances and spending a total of 40 minutes on the pitch), Fofana went on vacation in Florence and posted a photo of the cathedral. Why exactly in Florence? Because Moussa Diaby, friend and Aston Villa striker who is about to move to Al-Ittihad, got married in Tuscany. In short, Fofana gets to know the country in which he will live while waiting to be called for medical examinations.
