Football
9y

Alessandro Nesta: AC Milan have been 'left behind' in transfer market

Alessandro Nesta has toldĀ La Gazzetta dello SportĀ that the current AC Milan side do not come close to the one he played in between 2002 and 2012 because there is not the money to bring in quality players anymore.

Nesta, 38, is bringing his own playing days to an end with Chennaiyin FC in the inaugural Indian Super League, but Milan's plight has not escaped his attention.

With a gap of 14 points separating the Rossoneri from Serie A leaders Juventus (after playing the same number of games), the defender believes they are light years away from the side with whom he won the Champions League twice in 2003 and 2007.

In the interview with Gazzetta, the former Italy international was asked how big a difference there is between the two sides.

"I couldn't answer that because I'd be too offensive," he replied. "But you've also got to look at it this way -- we used to have 100 million euros to spend on the transfer market and now maybe they can muster five at most. The money is now elsewhere and we've been left behind. We can't even compete."

Because of that, Milan are unable to fund signings such as the ones which made them so strong in the first decade of the new millennium -- on players like Nesta [30 million euros], Thiago Silva and Zlatan Ibrahimovic [a combined 62 million euros].

"Players like those come at a price," Nesta said. "You can no longer afford to spend sums like that, and you can't find a compromise either. Maybe I would have kept hold of [Massimo] Ambrosini for an extra year as he could pass on the Milan way.

"Then there are other stories. I could have stayed, but I no longer felt capable of marking the likes of [Lionel] Messi. Then there were the sales of Ibra and Thiago Silva because they were no longer economically viable, but this is an Italian problem and not purely Milan's.

"[The current side have] great players, but we had Maldini and then there were [Alessandro] Costacurta, [Gennaro] Gattuso, [Andriy] Shevchenko -- people who didn't just play the odd good game, but always played well. The others did all they could to follow them."

Nesta, though, is not writing off Milan's chances of finishing in Serie A's top three this season.

"They can still aim for a place in the Champions League, even if they used to be able to aim at winning it. But only if they can find some consistency," he said. "I hope they will. Milan are far too big to be eighth.

"Inter [Milan] and Napoli are faltering too, which is a shame because it seems to be more about being the least bad rather than the best."

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