AC Milan will learn CAS fate tomorrow; Fassone seems positive about the hearing

AC Milan’s latest date in court was handled today, as Milan and UEFA went before the Court of Arbitration for Sport to determine if the punishment placed upon Milan was unfair for the violations that occurred.

Milan had received the harshest ever penalty for Financial Fair Play violations, as it appeared that UEFA was less than impressed with the business plans of former owner Yonghong Li. Now that Li is no longer in control of the club after he defaulted on a loan, with Elliott Management taking over, perhaps the objections over the club’s future ability to pay its bills will have been quelled.

Milan CEO Marco Fassone told Sky Sports Italia,

Today’s been very intense.

We’ve been here since 9:30 and there was ample time for all parties to be heard.

The feeling is that they listened very carefully. We got really stuck into the details, so now the panel has all the elements to reach a verdict.

Elliott? We tried to put together as much as we could in terms of legal support, and the presence of Franck Tuil certainly added to that

His presence at a time like this is certainly significant. The verdict? We expect it to arrive tomorrow morning

A longer trial should be a good sign for Milan. If the CAS had already made up its mind about the issue before the trial started, it would have been short. Additionally, asking more about the details is almost certainly a good sign as well.

Of course, trying to read the tea leaves on a court decision might well be a fool’s errand, and without being in the room, it’s hard to speculate about how the decision will go. However, given that the biggest objection from UEFA seemed to be the dodgy ownership of Li, and that has been resolved, perhaps the court will spare Milan.

Additionally, the punishments that Milan faced seemed to be (comparatively) rather harsh, so hopefully the CAS will see those as being unreasonable as well. Either way, the clouds of uncertainly that has been over Milan for months might be lifted at least a little bit tomorrow.