AC Milan club president, Paolo Scaroni, sits down in a press conference to discuss the 2020-2021 financial year. He is accompanied by CEO Ivan Gazidis, general manager Roberto Masi and director Giorgio Furlani.
Here are the words, as reported by MilanPress:
"The loss for the year ended at 98 million was approved for the financial statements while the consolidated one was 96.4 million. Gordon Singer has joined the board of directors in place of Gianluca D'Avanzo. For the stadium, I am convinced that we will not be able to become protagonists again if we do not have modern stadiums, comparable to those of the teams we play against in the Champions League. We have been talking about it for almost two years, on Monday we had a meeting with Sala and I came out comforted. The mayor agrees that a new stadium is needed to ensure that the two Milanese teams stop letting go their jewels like Lukaku and Donnarumma. We need a stadium that increases our income. I had words of reassurance from the mayor. We need to finalise details on real estate projects. We are optimistic, confident, we are moving quickly to get started as soon as possible."
Scaroni continued:
"Given that we plan to meet the municipal administration on the 23rd, we have to build the new stadium next to San Siro and there is no doubt. On the other hand, the whole real estate project that we had formulated two years ago, asks us a revision both to us and to the municipality. Times and needs have changed compared to two years ago. With the stadiums fully reopened, we hope to have even better results. The budget for 2022 is better than the result achieved in June, 30, 2021, so the improvement will continue. We'll see, it depends on many factors, first and foremost the sporting results and the qualifications to the Champions League."
On the Super League, Scaroni said:
"The Super League project as initially conceived has been shelved, but the problems of football are still there. The European Court will decide whether UEFA and FIFA have violated the competition rules: pending this I think everything is at a standstill. For me, 98 million losses are still a lot, certainly it's a nice improvement compared to 194 in 2020. I'm certainly not happy, even if we are in contrast with the others. Our shareholder continues to intervene according to our needs."
Chief Business Officer, Masi, had this to say:
"For the cost of labor we monitor three categories: employees, members of the first team and those of the youth and women. We are strengthening on the latter. We have hired other specialised professionals to develop the club. The other expenses have had an increase due to the lawsuit with Boban, which forced us to set aside a figure. On the players side, we have a containment in line with our multi-year strategy. Reopen the season ticket campaign? It is a hypothesis that we are evaluating, but only if the stadiums are reopened to a 100% capacity."
CEO Gazidis said:
"Thank you all for your support, your messages have given me incredible strength. I'm fine and I'll be even better. The way in which football is regulated is strange and belongs to the past. The game and the economic aspects have changed radically since UEFA and FIFA were founded. Whatever the future, clubs need to have a say. We are in regular contact with UEFA, the meeting we had scheduled has been postponed, probably at the beginning of 2022. On the FFP there will be a transition period to get to the new rules."
