MILAN: Italy’s traditional derby match between footballing giants Inter and AC Milan now has a distinct Asian flavor and following, fueled by multi-million dollar investments by the Chinese owners of the two clubs.
Sunday’s derby has gripped Milan including the city’s Chinatown district — and the football fever has spread as far as the Chinese capital Beijing.
The match is not only a duel between the city’s rival teams but also their Chinese owners — Zhang Jindong, whose Suning Group bankrolls Inter Milan and Li Yonghong’s Rossoneri Sport Investment Lux Group, which owns AC Milan.
The flags of both teams flutter across the long avenue via Paolo Sarpi in the heart of Milan’s Chinatown — where many of the city’s 29,000 Chinese residents live — ahead of the Derby della Madonnina.
The excitement is also building thousands of kilometers away in Beijing.
AC Milan officials on Friday launched the club’s Chinese branch to develop business partnerships.
“With an enormous base of devoted football fans in China, there is huge potential for AC Milan and for professional football in China,” AC Milan’s chief commercial officer Lorenzo Giorgetti said.
“We are going to organize an event starting from next Sunday with our Fan Clubs in Beijing.
“We are looking forward to embracing more and more Chinese partners who will help us on our journey back to glory!“
Most of the Chinese residents in Sarpi hail from the Zhejiang region in eastern China. The younger generation, in particular, have grown up with football and are devoted fans.
Many of them will be among the 70,000 spectators at the famed San Siro stadium for a match between two former European superpower teams hoping to rekindle their glory days through the big injections of cash.
AC Milan have been completely overhauled at a cost of €230 million (SR1.01 billion) by Li Yonghong, who already paid €740 million to buy the club last April.
But despite the heavy investment, Milan have failed to find their rhythm on the pitch yet, with Montella’s side currently sitting in seventh place on the Serie A table.
Milan last won the Serie A title in 2011 while Inter’s last championship was the previous season in 2010.
Zhang’s Suning group paid nearly €270 million for Inter Milan in June 2016.
The club finished a disappointing seventh last season, one place behind AC Milan, but have made a brighter start to the 2017-18 campaign, winning six of their first seven matches.
They currently sit third in the standings but are well aware of the added importance attached to Sunday’s traditional derby match.
Football: Milan derby fever rages from Chinatown to Beijing
Football: Milan derby fever rages from Chinatown to Beijing
Champions League winner PSG’s $168m payment top UEFA prize money list for last season
- The figures were confirmed in UEFA’s financial report published Tuesday for the 2024-25 season
- Seven teams got at least $116.5m in prize money compared to five that got a nine-figure payment the previous season
GENEVA: Champions League winner Paris Saint-Germain topped the UEFA prize money table getting 144.4 million euros ($168 million) last season as the competition paid an extra 400 million euros ($466 million) among Europe’s elite clubs in the expanded new format.
The figures were confirmed in UEFA’s financial report published Tuesday for the 2024-25 season, ahead of its annual congress next month in Brussels.
Inter Milan, the beaten finalist, also were second on the money list earning 136.6 million euros ($159 million) from the UEFA prize fund that shared 2.47 billion euros ($2.9 billion) among the 36 teams which each first played eight games in a single-standings league.
Seven teams got at least 100 million euros ($116.5 million) in prize money compared to five that got a nine-figure payment the previous season, when the total fund had been 2.08 billion euros ($2.42 billion) in the last year of the 32-team, group-stage format.
Aston Villa were the only quarterfinalist last season to get less than 100 million euros, earning a UEFA payment of 83.7 million euros ($97.5 million). That was partly explained by Villa’s lower UEFA ranking returning to the competition after a 41-year gap.
Real Madrid’s quarterfinal loss to Arsenal meant they earned less than 102 million euros ($119 million) from UEFA in the Champions League, which was a drop of 37 million euros ($43 million) from winning the title in 2024.
Madrid got an extra 5 million euros for winning the UEFA Super Cup against Atalanta, which got 4 million euros from that season-opening game.
Inter earned at least twice as much from the Champions League as each of the other four Italian teams in the competition.
Manchester City were the lowest earner of the four English clubs. The reigning English champion got 76 million euros ($88.5 million) after being eliminated in the knockout playoffs round in February by Real Madrid.
The smallest payment to a Champions League team was Slovan Bratislava getting less than 22 million euros ($25.6 million). The champion of Slovakia lost all eight league-phase games.
Europa and Conference money
The steep drop in payments from the Champions League to the second-tier Europa League was shown in title-winner Tottenham getting 41 million euros ($47.8 million).
Beaten finalist Manchester United were paid 36 million euros ($41.9 million) by UEFA last season and will get nothing this time after failing to qualify for any European competition.
The third-tier Conference League paid Chelsea 21.8 million euros ($25.4 million) for winning the title. Chelsea are now in the Champions League.
Presidential salary freeze
UEFA’s financial report shows its president Aleksander Ceferin took no pay rise last season.
The Slovenian lawyer earned “fixed compensation of 3,250,000 Swiss francs gross” with no bonus, the UEFA document said. That was the same as the previous year and equates to $4 million.
UEFA general secretary Theodore Theodoridis got raises in both his salary and bonus for a total of 2.05 million Swiss francs ($2.56 million).
