Ex-Milan doctor lifts lid on Van Basten ‘regret’, ‘saving’ Cassano’s life, Gullit and other tales

“I was a trauma surgeon, splitting my time between the Pro Patria athletics team and the national cross-country skiing team. I’d gone to the US to refine my skills, working with the San Antonio Spurs (NBA basketball team) and the Dallas Cowboys (American football team).

“AC Milan had Dr. Monti as their doctor, a brilliant one, but Berlusconi wanted to create a comprehensive healthcare facility and chose me, out of eight candidates, to be the director of the area. I started with nutrition. The fuel for high-intensity training is sugar, and Swedish studies of the time showed that by the end of the first half, the players had already used up all of it.”

Did you introduce the famous, much-discussed tart to Milanello to increase sugar levels? 

“Yes, Berlusconi himself was surprised that everyone ate whatever they wanted. Rules needed to be established. Tart was eaten as a snack and at pre-match lunches, but Berlusconi introduced other changes.

“For example, every doctor, from me to my colleagues in the youth academy, had to be available once a week. There were no cell phones, so they gave us a buzzer. When it rang, you had to run to the phone and call a Fininvest switchboard, which would inform you of the emergency intervention required by this or that player, for himself or a family member.”

“Berlusconi wanted the players to just focus on playing, for the club to address their every concern, whether it was a child’s fever or a wife’s illness.

Liedholm, the coach Berlusconi found at Milanello when he bought the club, didn’t seem enthusiastic about the modernisation…

“He was sceptical, but in 1988, during Sacchi’s Scudetto victory, he said we’d won because we’d introduced a new form of sports medicine. Dr. Monti told me that in previous years, the athletic trainer’s role would appear during the summer retreat and then disappear, something that seems unheard of today.

“We made it permanent and constant. We began working on preventing muscle injuries and tendinopathies, which still account for nearly 50 per cent of football-related injuries, because wear and tear is inevitable. In baseball, pitchers will suffer shoulder problems sooner or later.”

Let’s talk about Marco Van Basten, who retired at 30. You were against surgery on your ankle, which was weakened by thinning cartilage…

“I opposed the first operation, performed by Professor Marti, in St. Moritz, Switzerland. Professor Martens then intervened to repair the damage. Van Basten writes in his book [Fragile] that the surgeon told him he’d be back on the pitch in two months, and that he believed him. He then adds that everyone at AC Milan opposed the surgery. I fought until the end.

“Marti wanted to clean the cartilage. I told Marco that the minimal protection that was left shouldn’t be removed. It was no use, and I’m sorry, because he could have given himself and us another two or three years of his fantastic football. Van Basten was a born athlete.

“When he switched to golf, he got to a handicap of 3. Once he went skiing, something he’d never done before, and at the end of the day the instructor told him he was already skiing as if he’d taken twenty lessons. He had the natural ability to learn any motor skill. Marco remains my biggest regret.”

Gullit? 

“One evening, he calls me: ‘Doc, I have a little pain.’ It’s the week of Napoli-Milan on May 1, 1988 [the match that would effectively hand AC Milan their first Scudetto of the Berlusconi era] and I’m worried: ‘Ruud, come to my house on Via Novara.’ Gullit arrives, I examine him, find that there’s nothing seriously wrong with him, and I say: ‘Come on, stop by for dinner.’

“One of my two dachshunds nips Ruud on the calf. I disinfect the scratch and that’s it. The next morning, Gullit shows up at Milanello limping and with a visible bandage on his bitten leg: ‘Doc, have you seen your dog? I won’t play for Napoli.’

“I head towards the locker room and think that my career at AC Milan is over, that Berlusconi will fire me. When I get to the pitch, Gullit comes out smiling and without bandages: ‘Doc, it was a joke!'”

In his second time at AC Milan, between 2011 and 2017, he saved Antonio Cassano’s life?

“After landing at Malpensa, returning from a trip to Rome, Thiago Silva came to me: ‘Doctor, Cassano isn’t well, he’s confused.’ Dr. Mazzoni and I tracked him down in the parking lot. He wanted to drive home.

“We ran some basic neurological tests; something wasn’t right. I told him, ‘Go ahead, but Dr. Mazzoni will drive your car, and he’ll take you to the hospital.’ We didn’t know what it was; it could have been ischemia; we had to speed things up to minimize any damage.

“Mazzoni stayed in his room to sleep with him; it must not have been an easy night… The tests determined it was a neurological problem originating in the heart. Cassano underwent surgery, and the problem was resolved; he regained his fitness to compete. Cassano thanked me in his own way: ‘In the parking lot, your authority forced me to obey.’

“Incidentally, a few years earlier, Egidio Calloni had suffered the same thing. [former AC Milan centre-forward in the 1970s]. He was lucky twice: he fell ill while he was driving, he went off the road, and he survived.”