AC Milan club CEO, Ivan Gazidis, gave an update about his health and cancer treatment to the Corriere della Sera newspaper. He released the following words:
"I feel good: I am very busy, I am able to combine work and do therapy. It seems that they are having positive effects. They make me confident of a full recovery, I hope to come back as soon as possible. I can still follow Milan, I saw the good match against Cagliari and seeing San Siro alive again was exciting, I also felt the Curva."
On the fans affection:
"I was speechless for the messages I received from the great Milan family. All this is giving me incredible energy. Now I understand what the players feel when they are pushed by the fans in the stadiums."
On the focus on young players
"My experience begins in the US, there the success of MLS depends precisely on training young American footballers. In Premier League we completely renewed the development path of English players, clubs were given incentives to develop academies but you had to meet a lot of standards. A lot of money was invested at Arsenal in a program from 9 to 16 years old. We chose a totally international staff. The players who were 12 at the time, are now the nationals like Saka and Sancho... The philosophy was not to protect them from competition, as opposed to exposing them, therefore not the obligation to have a certain number of English players in the team , but the obligation to meet certain standards, so the English players had to live up to it. Nobody can think today of winning only with established champions. I think that Italian football is a bit conservative, like the English one 10 years ago, it has to look not only ahead but also outside, there are interesting ideas around. But something is changing, the national team proves it."
On AC Milan's strength:
"I give a lot of credit to the leadership of Pioli, a curious man, who follows how football evolves, but also to the hunger of the players", replied Gazidis, "Football is also a mental game. I read a very interesting book about tug-of-war: 'The Captain Class', there are studies, when one person pulls against another develops a certain strength, when there are eight people on one side and eight on the other we discover that the individual takes less. Because in a corner of the brain he thinks that someone else will take on his responsibility. There are players whose influence goes beyond the performance on the field, it develops in the 5% who give more to everyone the others. That's Ibra. But Kjaer is also a leader and, with different styles, there are also Kessie and Bennacer."
On the new stadium:
"We are ready. The sooner we do it, the sooner Milano will have not only one stadium worldwide, but two teams worldwide. It will be important for the city: people will come to Milan and it will be one of the places they will want to visit, such as the Duomo."
