Price of Ronaldinho may be too high for Milan

AC Milan vice-president Adriano Galliani said Monday the club's bid to lure Ronaldinho to Italy was far from being a done deal.

Following Milan's 5-1 thrashing of Reggina on Sunday, Galliani claimed that Milan had failed to agree a fee for Ronaldinho with his Spanish club Barcelona.

The news comes just over a week after Galliani said that were Ronaldinho to move from the Catalan giants, it would be to Milan.

“I don't know if a deal will be done,” said Galliani. “We have to operate within the framework of market conditions. If it happens, great, if not we'll change our objectives.”

Milan's offer is believed to be well below Barca's valuation of Ronaldinho and other teams, such as Chelsea and Inter Milan, possibly interested in the former double world player of the year may be able to offer more money.

While Milan have close contacts with Ronaldinho's brother and agent Roberto de Assis, they seemingly are not on quite such good terms with the Spanish giants.

“I've never said we are close to Barcelona. It's one thing to be close to Ronaldinho, quite another to be close to the club,” added Galliani.

“There are other teams as well as Inter that are interested in Ronaldinho. I've been dipping into the market for many years and there's nothing strange here.

“If Barcelona accept our offer we'll do a deal, if not we won't.”

It's not just Milan being priced out of a deal for the Brazilian, though, as Inter president Massimo Moratti admitted he too found Barcelona's demands too high.

“Ronaldinho is also expensive for us,” he said. “He's expensive for everyone.”

Galliani also admitted he was hoping for a slip-up from Fiorentina in the race for Champions League football next season.

La Viola have a four-point lead on Milan with four games to play.

“We believe in ourselves, the only way to qualify for the Champions League is to win all our matches, but a lot depends on Fiorentina,” he said.