He won one cup and was already thinking about the other. Thus Milan conquered the world

He won one cup and was already thinking about the other.  Thus Milan conquered the world

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The Rossoneri were screwdrivers and turned to memories of Rocco’s victories, with him they became gourmets. His greatest legacy is not the five European Cups he won during his reign, but the mentality he gave to Milan and, indirectly, to Italian football.

The mysterious hand that governs football meant that in the very days when Silvio Berlusconi died in a room of the San Raffaele, those who for thirty years were his fans, the Milan fans, remembered how it all began, with helicopters landing on the lawn of the Arena to the tune of the Cavalcade of the Valkyries, on a gloomy afternoon in 1986. The Milan fans, shocked by the expulsion of Paolo Maldini, argued and divided: this Gerry Cardinale, the new American owner, is a madman without a wallet like the Chinese of the quickly and easily forgotten parenthesis, or is he a visionary like Silvio was?

Because he, when it came to football, he was always one step ahead of the others: off the helicopter, put away Gianni Rivera, who was AC Milan’s vice president. He kept the wise Liedholm, also immortal, for a while, and then dismissed him. Choosing a curious coach from Fusignano who had done well with Parma in Serie C and B, to whom he put a phenomenal team in their hands that won everything that could be won. The Milan fans mourn their president, the one who for two thirds of his reign – before the decline in a world of football that had seen the petrodollars of emirs and sheikhs enter – had accustomed them to the “gift” at the end of the transfer market, a cherry on add to an already very rich and garnished cake. And if the gift was not unique, benders and gentlemen of the gallery even sketched a glimmer of dispute. Well accustomed, the screwdrivers looked down upon by the Interist bauscia of the Milanese bourgeoisie: Berlusconi had made them enter the Olympus of football that counts. They have become gourmets with a very good mouth after decades spent rehashing Rocco’s great and romantic past and the great international victories, but also the shame of the relegations to B and the transformation to supporting actors. Milan won and dominated, but Berlusconi was not satisfied, he was never satisfied: he had himself photographed with the Champions Cup and was already talking about the Intercontinental, he won the Intercontinental and gave his managers the mission to make him the most winner in football history. It was Milan’s luck.

In a football where now, squeezed between sheikhs and funds, the aim here is to get by, perhaps to reach the top four to appear in the Champions League, he did not allow exceptions to the categorical imperative given in 1986: to win, possibly always. Milan, which for some years has ceased to belong to him but which continues to be imbued with his thirty years of life even in the fireplace room at Milanello, has dedicated a photo gallery and a brief press release to him, which could only quote him: “Tomorrow we will dream of other goals, we will invent other challenges, we will look for other victories. That they are worth realizing what is good, strong and true in us, in all of us who have had this adventure of intertwining our lives with a dream called Milan”.

The club’s tweets sum up the epic: “A wonderful story,” “the president of our story. In the heart, in memory, in eternity”. The players who led him to be the most successful ever have invaded social media with images, graces and emotion. Pippo Inzaghi, one of his protégés, wrote that “for me you will always and only be the only, great president”. Alessandro Nesta, the one who bought in 2002 at the last second of the market, after freezing the fans with a “you can’t” said to the audience at the Rimini Meeting, limits his words as always, going to the essentials: “There are no sufficient words to testify esteem and gratitude. Rest in peace dear president.” Arrigo Sacchi in tears, Fabio Capello who defines him as a “genius”, Carlo Ancelotti who publishes a photo of the two of them together, in black and white.

All those who have passed through Milanello and left remember the President, with a capital “P”, even when Berlusconi was no longer president for a while. His greatest legacy is not the five European Cups won during his reign, but the mentality he gave to Milan and, indirectly, to Italian football. A club, the one founded in 1899 by the Englishman Herbert Kilpin, which has turned into a perfect actor for the biggest global stages, managing to combine the cult of the glorious past with the need to always go further, higher and higher with unparalleled skill. , to take yet another trophy. It is also for this reason that Milan supporters will not be able to have any other president but him.


  • Matthew Matzuzzi

  • Friulsardo, was born in 1986. Graduated in international politics and diplomacy in Padua with a thesis on Turks and Americans, he was a soccer referee. At Foglio since 2011, he deals with the Church, Popes, religions and books. Favorite writer: Joseph Roth (but anything related to the finis Austriae is fine). He has been editor-in-chief since 2020.

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