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Kaka to Man City: The Potential Effects on Calcio

January 16th, 2009 | By: Julian | 17 Comments »

It’s been far too long since I wrote in this blog- way too long. I could go on with a list of excuses- some legit (moving back into college, lack of news) and some less legit (my sheer and utter laziness) but I won’t. At this point I’d just like to thank you guys for still checking here. Because you guys deserve better. Now that I’m back at college and have a comfortable schedule with oodles of free time, I’ll be blogging more often. And this time, I mean it. Hopefully.

Last time we met, the transfer window just opened and we discussed a move to Man City for Gigi Buffon. Turns out Buffon isn’t good enough for Man Citeh though- or maybe he’s just too damn cheap. I mean, just look at what they use as toilet paper over in the Eastlands. They’re after Kaka now, and I’m sure you guys are as tired of hearing about this as I am. I’d just like to take a more Italia-oriented viewpoint at this.

On one hand, it could be very positive. Selling Kaka would mean that Milan loses a superstar- and undoubtedly one of the best players on this Earth when on form- but with 120 MILLION DOLLARS Milan could buy a brand new team. Or at least defenders/replacements for thier aging guys, which is mostly everyone on the team. The only problem is that Milan haven’t exactly been stellar at transfers in the past few years. They’ve brought back an aging and crappy Sheva and Ronaldinho, who is quite good but may be one of the reasons why Kaka wants to leave in the first place. Then again, they did bring in Pato, one of the most exciting and skilled young strikers out there. So losing one superstar could mean Milan would buy three or four more. Of course, this is risky because they might not do that. They could buy crappier players or even no one at all. But the tradeoff here could be worth it.

But on the other hand, this could be a huge loss for calcio and Serie A in general. Losing Kaka means losing one of the big superstars of the peninsula, and unless Milan bring in another one, Italy’s image will take a hit. It’s a delicate situation with no real answer. But so far, Kaka seems to want to stay. And the final word will be his. Let’s not forget that Kaka is not a mercenary- anything but. The man who so often has “I belong to Jesus” written on his undershirt is unlikely to be in this for the money. Would a true soccer superstar even want to leave a club like Milan and Champions League football next year for one mired in the relegation zone?

Even more disturbing is that this could leave calcio with a huge void. There’s a common notion that the three best players in the world currently are Messi, Ronaldo, and Kaka (And no I don’t really care if you agree with me on this. They’re the biggest superstars and on form are probably the best 3). If Kaka leaves, that means Serie A loses a very important reference point. Furthermore, it raises a ton of other questions, like club loyalty and the issue of a salary cap. This one transfer could open up a can of worms.

The Kaka saga aside, Serie A as a whole is in some exciting times. Juve and Inter are really close at the top of the table, and the bottom half of the table has some surprises of it’s own, like Samp and Udinese. Of course as a Roma fan I’ve been loving the recent resurgence and will be watching the rest of the games very nervously to see that we finish in the fourth spot. Don’t even want to imagine what will happen if we don’t.

Moving onto other topics, all has been relatively quiet on the Azzurri front. We still have that friendly against Brazil next month, and I’ll have a preview up soon. But there’s really been no huge news from Lippi or anyone else. Other than that he wouldn’t mind gay players on the team, and that’s hardly earthshaking stuff. Amauri is still a jackass and hasn’t picked a team and Buffon has finally returned from injury, but all in all it’s been a quiet time for Italy.

I was browsing theoffside.com as I often do, and I found a link to this excellent, excellent article. It’s very similar to something I was going to do, but this is written far better than I ever could’ve written it. I highly recommend that anyone even remotely interested in calcio- or soccer in general- give this a read.

So, while Italian soccer as a whole has been relatively quiet, the soccer world sure hasn’t- just ask Real Madrid.

Tags: Amauri, Buffon, Group E, Italy, Kaka, Lippi, Man Citeh

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Comments

By Jeff | January 16th, 2009 at 7:54 pm

As my friend has said numerous times for that much money how could Kaka not take the offer. He would be crazy not to. And that was an amazing article provided by the link. It was a very interesting read and really cool.

Posted from United States

By Mike | January 16th, 2009 at 7:55 pm

Man this kid is so smart

Posted from United States

By Anthony | January 17th, 2009 at 12:07 am

I never really liked Italian football to be honest. Then last year when Milan played us in the European Supercopa I gained a lot of respect not only for Kaká, but for Milan and Calcio. Of course it was hard losing in the biggest game in Europe, but what’s important is that Milan showed respect and held the game in memory of Antonio Puerta.

This whole Kaká thing is a joke and a low blow for Serie A. Of course there’s so many other amazing players in Italy but its deals like this that ruin football. Kaká is probably one of the only genuine nice guys in the game and he’s tempted by a situation like this. I mean he’s leaving a team that is constantly in Champions League (bar this season) and challenging for the Scudetto and he would leave them for a team thats battling to stay in the Prem? Ha, it’s so ridiculous… Then again, I’m not the one getting offered £350,000-£500,000 per week in salary (depending on which article you read). In the end of his career Kaká can look back and have one of two things.

1) A incredibly massive house, most expensive car, and a whole bunch of other materialistic objects.
OR
2) A cabinet full of trophies

As a footballer one’s success isn’t based upon how much money you make, but the end product – silverware.

By ricci | January 17th, 2009 at 2:11 am

hmmm…I feel like I saw a similar article to the one you linked us to a few months back on the Roma offside. The writer even used the same Dinho and Baggio goal videos. Maybe it’s the same guy who wrote it. If not, that’s pretty fucked up.

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By Julian | January 17th, 2009 at 9:57 am

Goal.com has an editorial about the Kaka situation here:
http://www.goal.com/en/news/1717/editorial/2009/01/17/1064924/calcio-debate-if-kaka-moves-to-manchester-city-football-is-dead

In usual goal.com fare it’s pretty over the top and blown a wee bit out of proportion, but they’ve got a point. Could this start a new precedent?

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By Matt | January 17th, 2009 at 11:59 am

Apparently Amauri’s passport situation has been severely set back because his wife didn’t meet one of the criteria of citizenship (residing in Italy for at least 10 years)… So, it looks like Amauri will have to play for Brazil or he may never play international level football.

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By John Silver | January 17th, 2009 at 4:55 pm

Thanks ever so much for the link, Julian – and ricci, that article as well as the Totti one are mine.

Have already submitted part 2 on furbizia. Should be up within a week (or two at most).

As for Kaka, I was thinking of writing an article on that myself. We’ll see.

By Julian | January 17th, 2009 at 5:19 pm

No problem John Silver. The article was so good that I felt like I’d be doing a disservice by not posting it. Good stuff.

And Matt, I couldn’t be happier. Now he hopefully gets called up by Dunga and puts an end to all this. Or even better- he never gets his passport and Dunga never calls him up. Serves him right for thinking that he’s better than all this.

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By John Silver | January 18th, 2009 at 2:32 pm

There goes my take on the Kaka question.
http://www.footballitaliano.co.uk/article.aspx?id=108

By 9 Champs leagues | January 18th, 2009 at 4:49 pm

guys, definately, kaka doesnt want to go but it seems the administrators have decided to take the offer from the english club…it must surely be hurting all Milan fans to see the lovable genius Kaka go but as Gianluca zambrotta admitted, even he would have gone if he had 15 million euro offer for a year…well, on the brighter side, milan deosnt need to worry, they have an upcoming icon in Pato, the boy is incredibly mature for his 19 years and is improving game by game, his stepovers yesterday when he left the likes of Gamberini for dead was awesome!!he will be the future icon for milan!!!
on the brighter side for Azzurri, the goal for Milan was created by an awesome trademark pass by Pirlo, a welcome sight to us all..he delivered that great through ball to pato!!
Forza Italia!!Forza Azzurri!!Forza Bari!!

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By tito | January 18th, 2009 at 4:54 pm

This is a magnificent transfer of wealth from the premiership to serie a.

100% good for calcio.

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By Bobo | January 18th, 2009 at 10:35 pm

Thank you, Tito. A massive injection of wealth into Serie A is never a bad thing… but something tells me that the Azzurri won’t see a dime of this. Milan will just buy more Brazilians and maybe branch into Argentina one of these days.

By Ben | January 19th, 2009 at 12:33 am

I dunno why people are saying he is choosing between money and glory. He is already earning 11million in milan and plus he probably has other income through adidas which would far outweigh any commerical income that he would gain from joining man city because AC Milan is a much renowed club than Man City. He can already buy the most expensive car, the biggest house and bunch of other things. He is not poor at Milan for goodness sakes. His decision is not based on money. The issue here is that he is forced out. There are number of factors pressuring him. The factors being tactical decisions of the coach, addition of other star players, debt of AC Milan and so on. Man City is just taking advantage of the situation and in my opinion they are doing a vey smart bussiness. First of all, they will gain international recognition and secondly addition of kaka would most likely instigate surge of signings of other stars. There will be domino effect albeit they don’t get relegated. So I think the 100million suggested is a very well devised plan on their part because the money includes many things other than the talent that kaka brings.

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By Ben | January 19th, 2009 at 12:47 am

In addition, I want to mention host of other reasons why this move to Man City IS not much about money on kaka’s part (of course for the board of milan, money is a big part). First of all, if kaka chooses to join Man City, he is throwing away his icon status in milan. Sure, he can be a star in Man City but being a star in Man City vs Milan is very different. When he plies his trade in milan like the legendary maldini, he would have much fame and status by the end of his career. This would lead to better income after his football life. My analogy as a college student would be choosing between Harvard vs a college in 2nd tier. Sure the 2nd tier college can provide stipend, scholarship and all that but what will it provide after college?????? Kaka indeed needs to think about these things and he does. He is not stupid and again he is not poor. His strong religious belief also goes against fetching for materialistic things. Of course, he would never leave for less money but I am trying to say money is not the deciding factor for him.

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By John Silver | January 19th, 2009 at 6:46 am

Ben – I agree there’s more than money involved in Kaka’s decision (mainly, it’s disillusionment with his current squad). But your last argument is moot. The extra money that Kaka would make in five years at Man City would far outweigh the capital he could earn in any post-football job.

By Forzafrankie | January 19th, 2009 at 10:55 am

I agree with Bobo. Please use this money on less Brazilians and bring home Rossi!

By brayas | February 12th, 2009 at 8:41 am

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