Chapter 8: The Death of the Milan Academy
The Milan Juniors team is completely different from the Pavia and Bergamo Juniors, they are a phalanx of professional junior players, among whom some of the best footballers aged 9-14 in the world are gathered.
Even Descartes' friend Agenari. Rossi is currently on this junior team as well.
However, Aguinari is still a little less old and less talented, and he is currently only a substitute for Milan's junior team and does not get the chance to play very often.
Among the Milan junior football team in front of him are the future members of the Italian national team, Abate and De Sciglio, and the superstar Paloski, who is only ten years old like Descartes but has already made a name for himself in Lombardy.
It looks like this Milanese teenager seems to be strong, right?
But if you think about it, they are backed by a towering tree like AC Milan, and they have the convenience of searching for young players of the right age all over the world, but in the end, they only cultivated such three players for Milan who have never been able to become a big player, is this the performance that a team with high expectations should have?
Compare them with their famous predecessors, Baresi, Costacuta, Maldini, Albertini, Pesoto, Ambrosini...... Isn't such a Milan youth football team a downfall?
In fact, the decline of Milan's academy has been evident since fifteen years ago.
In 1985, Maldini, the "soul of red and black", was transferred to the Milan senior team by then Milan coach Liedholm when he was only 16 years old, and since then the Milan academy has not produced any stars who can be called "great".
Although a loyal "last captain" Ambrosini came later, Ambrosini, he was already 18 years old when he entered the Milan academy.
Since then, Milan, although it has also produced members of the Italian national team such as Borriello, Toldo, Otto, Brocki, and Koko, these people can only be regarded as first-class players at best, not superstars.
The direct cause of the decline of Milan's academy is due to their president, Silvio. Silvio Berlusconi.
In 1966, Berlusconi entered Milanello with a strong political purpose, when he was in urgent need of a political platform to promote himself in order to run for the prime minister of Italy, although he owned three television stations, but in Italy, there were more than 200 pay TV stations, at that time, he could only be regarded as a small role in the political arena.
In order to better promote himself, Berlusconi ran for president of AC Milan (at that time, AC Milan was still a membership system, and it was not until 1986 that Berlusconi completed the acquisition of Milan). After that, he started the era when he turned his hands into clouds and rained in Milanello.
During that time, for the sake of his political future and glorious image, he spent a lot of money for Milan and reorganized Nerio. The golden combination of Rocco and Rivera defeated Ajax and Barcelona 4:1 and 4:0 respectively in the Champions League final, forming the great era of the "Dutch Three Musketeers...... Bei Bald's big money again and again has created Milan's great reputation in world football.
But we have to say that success is also bald, and defeat is also bald.
In order to achieve his political goals as soon as possible and quickly establish a glorious image among the people, Pei Bald chose a shortcut for quick success - he bought outstanding senior players at home and abroad, but neglected the construction and inheritance of Milan's academy.
As a result, even players like "Santo" had to travel to other places in order to get the opportunity to participate in the competition.
Berlusconi's emphasis on results and neglect of tradition led to the lack of Milan academy after the Milan academy, after the "golden backline" that dominated the Italian national team for two World Cups, Milan has no inheritance.
This investment has paid off in a short period of time, with Milan winning six Champions Trophies, five Super Cups, two Cup Winners' Cups, and four Intercontinental Cup winners' medals on the European stage, becoming the brightest star of Italy's European foreign war.
But when he resigned as Italy's prime minister in 2011, his enthusiasm for Milan waned, as he no longer needed Milan as a propaganda platform, and his political career was almost at an end.
Milan is no longer of any use to him.
So Bei Bald chose to give up.
At this time, Bei Bald,Focused more attention on those loli models with plump buttocks and fat breasts,We can't say that he diverted the money originally used to build the navy to build the Summer Palace like Cixi,But compared with his spending on the surname party,His investment in Milan during this period has basically been reduced to almost zeroγ
In this context, with the retreat of a group of powerful meritorious players, and the lack of ability to transfuse blood for the senior team in a timely manner, Milan has finally become the "black and hard" sling army, as I said at the beginning, many people jokingly call them: Milan Waste Recycling Energy and Environmental Protection Group.
Because they always recruit stars who are almost out of breath, they almost turned Milan into a retirement home, and the superstars who are in their playing years have left one by one, from Sheva to Kaka to Silva, and I don't know how many Milan fans are sad and heartbroken.
These are all tragic events that have happened since the city of Milan, so let's turn our attention back to this regional match between Pavia Juniors and Milano Juniors.
Despite the downfall of the Milan junior team, they still have enough reason to be proud and proud compared to the amateur junior team composed of a group of primary and secondary school students.
So for this game, the coach of the Milan junior team, Mr. Evani, was hardly bothered.
He simply told his young players to follow the usual pace of training for the game, and in Mr. Evani's mind, Milan's opponents were only their city rivals, Inter's junior team.
You must know that compared with the miserable youth training results of AC Milan after Bei Bald became the owner, the Inter Milan academy at this time can be called a strong soldier. Moratti not only has a penchant for collecting adult stars, but he also has a penchant for Shota Jr.
In the 2000-2001 season of the Inter Milan junior football team, there were a large number of outstanding young players such as Balotelli, Thornton, Martins, etc., and they even swept the Juventus junior football team 11:3 in a friendly match, and the powerful attack power was eye-catching for the whole of Italy.
And this Pavia junior football team in front of you?
I'm sorry, but Mr. Evani really didn't take them seriously.
The only thing he knew was that the Pavia Boys team was always playing well in the first half, but as soon as it came to the second half, they were completely deflated, and it was said that this was similar to their core player, who was called Descartes. The little one of Mondilo has a direct relationship.
For Descartes, Evani was still very impressed, because it was he who personally handed over the medical examination report to this lonely teenager.
It is true that Descartes has shown more talent on the court than most of his peers, but his technique and speed are not the most prominent, and his real strength lies in his sense of smell and big picture, but to Mr. Evani's regret, his illness has directly cut him off from becoming a professional footballer.
Even if he performs well at such a young age? Once on the field of adult football, his physical fitness and medical problems can be the biggest obstacles preventing him from continuing his football career.
Mr. Evani is a famous former Milan player, and he understands the basic law that youth football depends on technique and senior football depends on the body.
Even if he is as strong as a brutalist striker like Vieri, when his physical function gradually declines, he is not reduced to a mediocre player?
Not to mention a teenager like Descartes, who was born with a physical disease?
So even if Evani admires Descartes very much, he has no intention of re-recruiting Descartes into the Milan youth team, on the one hand, because he believes that Descartes will not have the opportunity to set foot in the professional football field in the future, and on the other hand, he is also worried about the health of this teenager, don't you see, even the coach of the Pavia junior team only allows him to play 45 minutes per game, which actually shows that the other party has great concerns.
However, the outcome of a football match is not decided by 45 minutes, and it is only after the final whistle blows that you can be sure whether you are a winner or a loser.
Therefore, Evani's advice to the Milan Juniors in this game is to pay attention to possession and defense in the first half, try to let the core player of the Pavia Juniors run out of energy and go off the field, launch a counterattack in the second half, and decide the winner in 45 minutes.
He was confident in his strategy, and it wasn't until he saw the line-up for the Pavia Junior team that a sense of foreboding came to his mind.
That Descartes didn't play?
Evani subconsciously turned his gaze to the sidelines, and he saw the teenager who even felt sorry for himself standing on the edge of the court, warming up intermittently and chatting with his teammates.
Evani suddenly felt that something was wrong, was his strategy of defending in the first half and attacking in the second half seen through by the opponent?
He wanted to shout to his young players on the sidelines, asking them to change their strategy to attack in the first half and defend in the second half, but after thinking about it, he interrupted the thought again.
What if you put that little player in the second half? The Milan youth team has gathered the best football seedlings in the world at this age, and after their own professional and systematic training, will they still be afraid of such a little guy who is destined not to become a professional football player?
Let's start the second half!
Mr. Evani was confident in his disciples, but on the other side, Descartes was anxious about the situation on the field.
"Is it really feasible for you to do this, Monsieur Mancard? You see, even Aguinari, the former main player of our team, is sitting on the bench, the quality of the Milan team is simply too strong, I am afraid that I will be a little too late to play in the second half......"
"Quiet, Descartes!" Mr. Mankaard glared at him and reassured, "Forget what I told you, you have to learn to trust your teammates." β
Descartes nodded silently and turned his gaze back to the court.
As soon as the whistle blew, the match between Pavia Juniors and Milan Juniors officially began.
If Mr. Evani had been able to predict the outcome of this game, he would have completely reversed his pre-war strategy, but unfortunately he was too confident in his team and did not take timely remedial measures, which caused his biggest regret after the game.
In an equally conservative first half for both sides, both teams played very dullly, and it was not until the end of the 45th minute that Milan Juniors scored just one goal, while Pavia Juniors handed over duck eggs.
But when the whistle blew at the start of the second half, Descartes stepped onto the court with confidence, and everything started to look different!