There has been a deafening silence surrounding communication from the Club that has only increased as key players left following Gerald Cardinale's purchase of AC Milan. Whereas Elliott Management was transparent with fans, creating the best relationship between the Club and the fans in my memory, RedBird Capital has chosen the polar opposite position. Which is odd, for a company that specializes in investing in Sports, Media, and Entertainment, the expectation would be a focus on marketing and communications to grow their investments in those fields. However, between denying fans access to friendlies and limiting official announcements and decreasing informational posts on social media finding out what is actually going on at Milan has been a struggle for Milan fans. Not only have there been plenty of misunderstandings betwen the club and the fans, but it has often left us suffering in silence.
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| "The Sound of Silence," a banner from Curva Sud's protest at the end of the 2023-24 season. |
Perhaps it is ironic to say that communication was better under the CEO that infamously went behind the backs of his Technical Director and Sporting Directors to hold talks with a potential replacement for manager and/or them, then sacked the Director who informed the public of his discretion. Or the guy who infamously continued to mislead his Technical Director in regards to the upcoming mercato plans as the team were on their way to win their first Scudetto in 11 years, while he failed to communicate the fact that Milan was about to be sold. Yet Ivan Gazidis did those things and was still better at communication with the fans than his replacement or Gerald have ever been.
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| How did this guy become the hero in this story? |
Once Gazidis's contract was up and Elliott's Portfolio Manager, Giorgio Furlani, was appointed as CEO in December of 2022, communication immediately went downhill. Who could have predicted that someone with zero football experience, nor any experience in public relations at all would have been so terrible at communicating with "the customer?" Certainly not Gerald. Or Elliott. Or whomever is behind his appointment. But at least we still had Paolo Maldini as Technical Director to give interviews before and after matches and speak up on important issues. Until Furlani suddenly had him sacked in June.
The narcissistic free-for-all of managerial chaos that followed the departure of Maldini and Massara was accompanied by some pathetic attempts at damage control in the form of gaslighting, then an almost complete media blackout. For example, Geoffrey Moncada had been the head scout at Milan since 2018. However, fans had been worried, as his contract was up as of June 30th, 2023, and other clubs had reportedly been after him.
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| The Curva's message from May 2024: "A winning project starts from the company." |
With so much up in the air, and their insistence that they were not going to appoint people in traditional roles, but rather a "working group," they also failed to announce when they renewed his contract. Like they have flooded our social media feeds with content to sell us stuff and have discontinued a lot of their more informative content like players departing, etc. on socials, but this time, they failed to even announce such an important renewal on their website, like they do with every other appointment, renewal, or exit. (Actually, a number of important announcements were lost in the confusion.)
Instead, like most other important announcements, this was communicated through the press. Which began a very worrying trend that was actually worse than just silence. Instead of making official announcements through club channels, things were regularly announced through the press, just like every rumor and report about transfers, every journalistic theory, every pundit's opinion, and any other random thing that would get these outlets clicks. The average fan would be unable to sift through the noise to know what was true and what was just rumor or speculation.
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| It's like a double communication void. |
Since that point, there has been a very obvious trend that accompanied credible reports about things going on behind the scenes at the club. For example, this season, after it was reported that Maignan's renewal was agreed upon, then he had a few errors, suddenly there were reports as disturbing as Conceição being concerned with the goalkeeper's weight to reports that the renewal was on hold because the club was worried about his age. While I had ignored those things as media clickbait, in hindsight, from what we learned about what actually went down with Maignan's renewal being ignored, they seem like something more insidious.
Like so many other events of the last two years, every time this management was about to do something unpopular, there would be a well-timed media smear campaign against the popular player, manager, or whomever the management were about to wrong. Or a positive campaign about management that was always too good to be true. I know this sounds like a conspiracy theory, but given the way Furlani and friends have worked, as well as the atrocious and heartless things they have actually said and done, is it really that far-fetched?
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| Two top players who should have been renewed ages ago, both mistreated by the club and in the press. |
I mean, Theo Hernández had such a rough year personally and on the pitch, and enough people outside of the club trying to (and succeeding at) destroying his reputation. But as the season drew to a close, despite some great performances, there was a constant media smear campaign, riddled with reports that the club were not going to offer him a renewal. Not to mention the age-old story about his excessive contract demands, which he and his agent had already denied so many times. He did his best to counter it with reports from his agent about how much he wanted to stay, how much he wanted to renew, and how the club had not sat down with them yet. But in the end, he was just another player to them. Disposable in their eyes. There is no humanity or even footballing vision in how these people work, let alone how they communicate.
Then you look at their spokespeople. From day one, Furlani seemed to enjoy attention, but was seemingly self-aware enough to realize that he was not good at public speaking. He has gotten braver, perhaps all of the "Furlani is cooking" worshippers after that first transfer window gave him a false sense of courage. But now, most fans wish he would never speak, because it is very clear that he does not have anything worth saying. Moncada seemed to actually fear the spotlight, it was hard to even find photos of him for the longest time. Yet when he finally gave a full interview and has increasingly given more prematch or postmatch statements, it is clear that his confidence in his abilities as a Technical Director far exceeds his actual skills, and that there is a reason he should have remained a Head Scout.
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| Everyone made the list... "leave and free Milan from this agony." |
Then you have Paolo Scaroni, the man with a thousand board positions, and an equal deficit of morals. He is a decrepit, unlikeable old man who will say anything someone pays him to. And, while I have heard some people say that Italians love him, his appointment as Milan's President and representative in meetings and other formal settings has certainly gained the ire of the Curva Sud and many other fans recently. Personally, I have never heard him make a statement that I was proud of or even agreed with. I have no idea why he exists, let alone has been allowed to represent such a storied club like AC Milan.
Last, but certainly not least, there is Zlatan Ibrahimović. As a player, his words often got him into trouble. But after six months getting acclimated in his new role as RedBird's Senior Advisor to Milan, management pushed him in front of the cameras as the default spokesperson for press conferences. At a bizarre, pompously titled press event last summer, he infamously said "We are not going to speak unless we have something to say," then went on to give a dreadful 90 minute-long press conference with about five minutes worth of actual helpful information. He included his usual egotistical buzz phrases like "I am a lion" and "I am the boss," which did not help him or the club. While his press conferences did improve over time, it has finally become clear to these guys that he is not the one that should be speaking for the club. Certainly, Furlani is quick to point out that he does not work for Milan.
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| Communication with the fans is just a joke with these two. |
Gerald made a few statements the first season, but it was after sacking Maldini that he infamously made a promise to fans in Capri while on vacation that "his investments are to bring Milan to the top and win!" After having spent so much that summer to try to buy back the fans following his terrible decision to get rid of Maldini and Massara and selling Tonali, he came to a number of matches, and would make statements about Milan and the stadium here and there. But as performances dropped and fan discontent increased, he slipped into an absent silence.
This season, I think he only came to a couple of matches, the last one being the Real Madrid Champions League match in Spain. Given the way things were going south with Fonseca and the team, he did not even dare to show his face at the 125th Anniversary match in December or the party a few days later. But it was in that environment that the renewal of his loan with Elliott through 2028 was announced, also coinciding with the release of a recent interview in the most tone deaf of communications. And he seemed somehow surprised at the backlash from his poorly timed announcement and the even more poorly worded interview.
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| Cardinale is only interested in Milan fans when they like him. |
He did not attend another match all season. But he did continue to travel around giving advice to people about investing in sports at his speaking engagements, where he continued to moan about how in Europe, football fans act like they own the clubs. Something he knew about years before he bought Milan. He continues to invest in more media and entertainment investments, and gave fans hope when he was asked about investing in an American sports team, but then said the profit margin is not big enough for him.
All this, while the drama around Milan hiring a proper Sporting Director was being discussed daily in Italy, yet he said absolutely nothing. And when the season was ending so poorly, it was reported that he had to step in and call Furlani every day until Tare was hired, because Furlani had started to publicly imply that we might not hire a Sporting Director at all. But still complete silence from him in the public eye.
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| For a guy who speaks so many languages, he sure does not know how to communicate. |
That silence from Gerald and RedBird was something Toulouse fans also took issue with. RedBird also owns the French club, and when their President, Damien Comolli, stepped down, to join, ironically, Juventus, they were very upset. In a statement from their supporters, they pointed out:
"As of today, Toulouse FC has no president, no CEO, and no public figure to represent our colors. Beyond urgently filling these key roles, we demand transparency... The silence must end... Toulouse FC is not a line item in a spreadsheet. It is an institution. It's time to respect it."
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| Embarrassing when supporters make better statements than their owners. |
This was after a season of Milan supporters singing "Cardinale Vattene" ("Cardinale Go Away") and right after their epic "Go Home" message at the Monza match at San Siro. Pietro Paolo Virdis, former AC Milan striker, wrote eloquently about this protest as well on his social media. He pointed out:
"...Every passion deserves respect, every passion deserves to be reciprocated with the same intensity. Not with silences, escapes, or even worse, phrases, of circumstance, words, promises... Words, words, words."
"You can't live looking at the past, but it is necessary to take refuge in what you were to forget what you are. We deserve to be what we were. We deserve to be part of history, not a sector of any investment hidden by false or weak Milan supporters. We are not a holding, we are not a fund, we are AC MILAN."
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| The fans have been very clear in their communications to management. |
It had been a busy week, as Igli Tare had been announced as Milan's new Sporting Director just a few days later, and Massimiliano Allegri was hired once again as Milan's manager for next season and announced the same day as the Toulouse fans' statement was released. RedBird was falling woefully short of expectations, despite making some fundamental changes at the larger of the two clubs.
Those changes are changes that should have happened two years ago. They still have so much catching up to do with the previous ownership, who offered all friendlies and many Primavera matches available for free on the official Milan App, for example. Ever since Gerald has taken over, the club is far more focused on selling fans stuff than allowing us to watch matches, or even telling us when they are in a timely manner. Which is pretty ironic considering his first foray into sports was helping to create a broadcast channel for the New York Yankees baseball organization. There are endless examples of how poor the communication has been under Gerald's watch, it is actually mindboggling to try to begin to list them all.
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| Gerald ignoring one of his biggest assets, while subtly deriding the "customers" of that asset. |
I honestly have not kept up with the plight of the Toulouse fans, because it has been so much just dealing with Milan's chaos. But it says a lot about an owner of two football clubs that their fans and ex-players can communicate so much more effectively than Gerald or the people he has hired. At the very least, a company that invests in Sports, Media, and Entertainment should be able to hire competent people to communicate. And when those people fall so short of expectations that they cause significant depreciation of his assets and upset all the "customers," the fact that he does not have the balls to fire them and hire qualified people says even more about his inability to communicate. But while he continues to hide in his office far removed from the passionate protests of fans, it is the teams and the fans who continue to suffer in silence.
This post inspired by the music of Theo Evan's "Shh"