CM: Gimenez wins battle to stay at Milan – Allegri must help him repay €36m investment

Despite all of the noise around his future, Santiago Gimenez ended up remaining at AC Milan and now he wants to show his worth.

Calciomercato.com reports that the swap between Roma and Milan – which would have brought Artem Dovbyk to the Rossoneri, with Gimenez going the other way – was never that close to happening in the end.

The Mexican remained at Milan and will now be available to Massimiliano Allegri despite sporting director Igli Tare’s attempts to offload him. The pressure had become so intense that the Mexican finally opened up to Roma with just 24 hours to go.

Truth be told, it wasn’t a completely convincing offer, so much so that a few hours later his agent Rafaela Pimenta posted a social media message announcing that her client would be remaining with the red and black.

Photo: Marco Rosi + Marco Luzzani/Getty Images

Santi gets his wish

In the end, Gimenez won. Regardless of the technical considerations Milan made in the summer, Santi’s permanence presents Allegri with an incontrovertible fact: the former Feyenoord player is the only centre-forward available, at least until January.

This consideration cannot be seen as a defeat, given that we’re talking about a player who last season had a great Champions League campaign, scoring a brace against Bayern Munich. Gimenez has no shortage of mitigating circumstances, too.

He arrived in January amid general chaos, with a fairly serious muscle injury, and despite everything he scored six goals in 14 appearances. The feeling is that the communication was not correct for a €36m winter investment, signed by Giorgio Furlani, the current CEO.

Gimenez has not been great in the first two league games, but it is natural to be negatively impacted by the excessive pressure placed on his performances. He can still improve though, especially under a coach like Allegri, and with the external noise now muted he can focus on scoring goals.