Why AC Milan And Inter Want To Demolish San Siro Stadium

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For the moment The Stadio Giuseppe Meazza, better known as "San Siro" will remain.

Transcript

00:00Italian football's toxic love affair with money, and by extension the subsequent lack of it,

00:04has meant that Serie A as a whole has really struggled to compete with the rest of Europe.

00:08But the brilliant thing about football is that for all the financial side has seemingly become everything,

00:14sometimes teams can just push themselves well beyond merely the station of their own spending power.

00:20Thus, despite an outlay of just 50 million euros between them in the last 12 months,

00:24or about what Man City spent on Calvin Phillips on the other side of the draw,

00:28both Milan clubs have fought through to a Champions League semi-final clash,

00:32and one that might well become symbolic not just for the players or the fans, but for the San Siro as well.

00:39In all likelihood, these will be the last major European Cup knockout games to ever be played there.

00:46Put simply, if either team wants to make progression in this competition a habit once again,

00:51it'll almost certainly need to be knocked down.

00:54But why Bulldo is one of football's most iconic venues?

00:59This is the story of the final years of San Siro.

01:03The basic argument for the total destruction of Stadio Giuseppe Miazza is as follows.

01:09In order to keep up with their European competition, Milan and Inter must increase their incomes.

01:14To do this, both clubs need a new stadium.

01:17Either they demolish and rebuild at San Siro itself, or they leave and build elsewhere,

01:23in which case the current ground would almost certainly have to come down anyway.

01:27The reality is it can hardly be left standing around in a state of decay,

01:30and there would be almost no way to repurpose it.

01:33Plans to raise and replace this stadium have been circulating for years, but the same questions remain.

01:38Will they do it? Won't they do it? Why will they do it? And when?

01:41In our most recent issue, 442's Tom Ginoy travelled to Milan itself and uncovered a tale of footballing royalty and architectural majesty,

01:49of political gridlock and bureaucratic inertia, of burning mopeds and, inevitably, of Silvio Berlusconi.

01:55You can read the entire piece and of course many more in the new edition, available now from the link in the description.

02:01But the key here is this.

02:02In 2022, Milan were bought by US-based investment group Redbird Capital.

02:08The 1.2 billion euro price tag was a record for a European football club outside the Premier League,

02:15and the prospect of a new stadium, with all of its attendant money-making potential, made up a sizable part of that project.

02:21And now, the owners want to push on with what they paid so much for.

02:26Time, you see, is money.

02:28And Redbird Capital want to make money from sellable naming rights, lucrative concessions, hospitality lounges, offices, concerts and NFL games,

02:37all revenue streams of which the existing stadium offers next to none.

02:42San Siro, in its current form, is certainly not swamped with amenities.

02:46Inside and out, there is very little to be found in the way of comfort or commerce.

02:50The barren landscape that surrounds the ground is only punctured on matchdays by burger vans and people selling scarves and souvenirs.

02:56There are no cafes, no shops, no restaurants, barely anywhere for fans to congregate safely, and certainly no areas for families or children.

03:05Football as a spectator experience is virtually unrecognisable from 30 or 40 years ago,

03:11but in Milan, almost no compromises to the modern game have ever been made.

03:16To some, including fans of both clubs and tourists alike, this is what makes the stadium so important.

03:21This is why preservation as a time capsule of a different age should matter.

03:26But to the owners, this isn't a positive.

03:28This is paralysis.

03:30And one shared by the country's government after a 2020 investigation by Italian heritage authorities

03:35found no cultural or artistic reason to enforce any form of preservation on the stadium.

03:42In a story of so many lasting uncertainties, here are a selection of straightforward facts.

03:47The stadium will host the opening ceremony at the Winter Olympics in 2026.

03:52Salah's second and final term as mayor concludes in the same year, meaning Milan will have a new municipal governor.

03:59The current lease deal between the city and the two clubs, the basis for Milan and Inter's tenancy at San Siro, expires in 2030.

04:06The fact is, there are a great number of possible endings to this story.

04:10Plenty of them are plausible, but many involve a gloomy climax for the Stadio Miata.

04:15If one thing is true, it's that nothing is settled yet, but the dark clouds are forming nonetheless over San Siro,

04:21and time is not on the stadium's side.

04:23To be blunt, if you've never been, go soon, as the future of a footballing icon is hanging by an ever-thinning thread.

04:31When Inter fans dumped a moped over the railings of the San Siro's second tier in a 2001 game between themselves and Atlanta,

04:37a curious trophy appeared in the Curva Nord.

04:41A moped belonging, so the tale goes, to the opposing capo and captured in a pre-match scuffle.

04:47They would never have managed it had it not been for the stairless access provided by the stadium's iconic exterior ramps.

04:53Nowhere else in world football would this legendary terrorist story,

04:57or act of hooliganism comprising theft, arson and criminal damage, depending on your viewpoint,

05:02have been possible.

05:03And to some, that's a reason to burn the whole thing down and start again.

05:08But football is entirely defined by its stories that could only happen to one club,

05:13or to one manager, or in one rivalry, or even between the walls of one stadium.

05:19Lose those wonky and often problematic cultural touchstones,

05:23replace them with sleekly designed concrete revenue streams that appeal to everybody and nobody all at once,

05:28and you lose something of the game at the same time.

05:31And so, for fans of either Milan club, this semi-final is about so much more than the mere progression to the showpiece main event in Istanbul.

05:39It's now about the legacy, the fate, the history and the future of their very home itself,

05:45and that is a game of football that could simply only be played in San Siro.

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