GdS: Two old friends and a €12m project to save – Oddo begins ‘act four’ at Milan | OneFootball

AC Milan have decided to make a change to try and bail out their Milan Futuro project from a disastrous first year, and it means the return of Massimo Oddo.

As La Gazzetta dello Sport write, the management have decided to overhaul things with the Futuro currently third-bottom. Out goes Daniele Bonera as head coach, in comes Oddo to replace him with Mauro Tassotti next to him.

Oddo lands at Milanello after the club’s failed attempt to hire Alberto Bollini, the Italy U19 coach, but this is a small story that doesn’t change much. For Milan, Oddo is not a second choice and he doesn’t feel like one.

It’s his fourth act at Milan, after two years with the Primavera and two experiences in the first team (from January 2007 to the summer of 2008 and from 2009 to 2011). Massimo finds an environment that has profoundly changed since he played, but the electric gate and clubhouse remain the same.

What is new is, if anything, the structure that will welcome him, the Milan Futuro Sports Centre that stands close to the external pitch, created specifically for the second team. There is everything you need: offices, dressing rooms, gym, video room, massage room and so on.

This is because the management of the Futuro is – in smaller terms, but not that much – the same as the first team. A handful of metres separate them: the project was based on a substantial synergy, even if this aspect turned out to be one of the biggest difficulties.

More Stories about Milan Futuro

GdS: Two old friends and a €12m project to save – Oddo begins ‘act four’ at Milan

25 February 2025, 18:00

Official: AC Milan name Massimo Oddo as new head coach of Milan Futuro

25 February 2025, 14:59

GdS: Defeats, red cards and logistics – how Milan Futuro found themselves in crisis

24 February 2025, 14:55

He will encounter two old friends from his previous spells at Milan. One is Tassotti, who he had as assistant coach under Ancelotti, Leonardo and Allegri. The other is Zlatan Ibrahimovic, with whom he shared the locker room in 2010-11, the year of the 18th Scudetto.

Oddo was not a player at Milan for a lifetime (80 total appearances) but he has experienced league title wins, and brought home the  2007 Champions League from Athens plus a Club World Cup, a Supercoppa Italiana and a European Super Cup. Five trophies in 80 appearances isn’t bad.

Oddo was a forerunner of the modern interpretation applied to full-backs. A man of thrust and tactical intelligence, a runner and raider but at the same time a player of balance, but he is an intriguing and intellectual character off the field too.

His union conscience, for example (in the past he also dealt with the renewal of the collective contract between footballers and the Lega Serie A), showed the desire not to limit his horizons to just the football field.

Image: AC Milan

Massimo was one of the few footballers to graduate – with a doctorate in Legal and Managerial Sciences of Sport from the University of Teramo (Atri branch) – in the year of 2011, with a thesis on MilanLab.

He graduated with a nice 108 and at the time had other ideas on how to fill his days when he would stop playing: “I would like to carve out a role for myself as a manager in football, sit behind a desk.” Now he needs to coach, and he needs to do it very well.

The club have put a €12m project in his hands. Oddo already experienced Serie C while in charge of Padova and hopes to use it this season but  also next season with Milan Futuro. Challenge accepted, with his old friends Tasso and Ibra at his side.