Kessie opens the door to Milan departure by rejecting contract offer
Martin Macdonald
- 9 Sept 2021 14:07 BST
- 6 min read
Milan midfielder Franck Kessie has again rejected a new contract offer from Milan, with this deal being worth up to €6.5 million per season.
Kessie's current deal with the Rossoneri runs out in the summer of 2022 and as such the club are scrambling to tie him down to an extended contract to avoid the risk of losing him for free.
In the recently closed transfer window, Milan lost key players Gianluigi Donnaruma and Hakan Calhanoglu after fresh terms weren't agreed with that pair before their contracts expired.
Kessie previously indicated a desire to stay at Milan forever, saying in July:
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“I’m proud to have chosen Milan and it’s not my intention to leave,” Kessie told Gazzetta dello Sport.
“Indeed, I want to stay forever.
“Now it’s the Olympics, but when I come back, I will fix everything. There will be no problems, I always keep my word. The club has always known that my will is to stay with the Rossoneri. An important season awaits us.
“I only want Milan. We are a fantastic group; I can’t wait to be able to hug my teammates and the coach again. We will have to live up to the name Milan have in Europe.
“We have to aim for the maximum in every competition, both in the League and in the cups. We will not disappoint."
Who could Kessie sign for?
Liverpool chose not to strengthen the midfield element of their squad this summer but were previously linked with a move for Kessie.
Nevertheless, if he were to receive a concrete proposition from Liverpool, he would surely have to consider his options.
Calciomercato reports that there is no club as serious about signing Kessie at present as Spurs, though the ability of the London club to nail down such a player may well hinge on how they fare between now and Christmas.
Kessie is a player who will be playing Champions League football wherever he is next season, and for Tottenham that means breaking into a top-four race that appears destined to be dominated by Manchester United, Manchester City, Liverpool and Chelsea.
PSG are known to be in the market for midfielders, with their efforts this summer stifled by their inability to offload any of their present mediocre bunch. As such, Eduardo Camavinga slipped away to Real Madrid.
Paul Pogba is another option for PSG, but if the World Cup winner remains at Manchester United, Kessie would come into sharp focus. He is a player they have been linked with before, and as a francophone he would surely settle quicker in the French capital than the Premier League.
Having worked the free agent market expertly in the 2021, pinning down Kessie early would be a fine start to next summer’s work. There is even a suggestion by Foot Mercato they could launch a January move.
Man Utd
Another club with a long-standing interest in a central midfielder, he represents to Manchester United a potentially cheaper option than West Ham’s Declan Rice, whose hefty price tag has been off putting.
Kessie, though, is a player who occupies a similar role to that of Pogba, so any move to Old Trafford may be contingent on the former Juventus player departing.
Chelsea
The outsiders of the bunch given that they have been linked to numerous other central midfielders and not yet Kessie. However, he offers a similar profile to other players that Chelsea have been linked with.
Rice may ultimately prove more appealing given that Chelsea are a club with an eye for a spectacular move.
Read more about: Serie A, Premier League, Chelsea, Liverpool, Man Utd, Milan, Milan, PSG, Tottenham, Declan Rice, Eduardo Camavinga, Franck Kessié, Hakan Çalhanoğlu, Paul Pogba
