GdS: ‘An own-goal for Milan’ – Vasquez returns to face his parent club | OneFootball

There are several sub-plots to AC Milan’s game against Empoli tomorrow evening, and one of them concerns Devis Vasquez.

As La Gazzetta dello Sport report, Vasquez is a player owned by Milan who will make his San Siro debut on Saturday, but as an opponent. It has been a rather strange path to this point, but one that sees him as one of the goalkeepers in Serie A with the highest stock.

With five clean sheets in 13 appearances and just 11 goals conceded, Vasquez is the final defender in an Empoli rearguard that is the fourth-best in the league. He landed at Milan in January 2023 with big question marks, never making his debut, and instead featuring twice for the Primavera.

The Rossoneri never really took a chance on him, sending him on loan to Sheffield Wednesday – where he saved a penalty on his cup debut – and Ascoli, with whom he suffered relegated to Serie C last year.

Empoli have a buy-out option at the end of the season for €900k. In hindsight, this is ‘an own goal for Milan’, who in recent years have focused on Marco Sportiello and Antonio Mirante as Mike Maignan’s deputy.

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Of course, the club have no shortage of goalkeeping talent like Lorenzo Torriani, Noah Raveyre, Lapo Nava and Alessandro Longoni, but more specifically on the Vasquez operation his market value is definitely now higher than €900,000.

In September he was man of the match in a 0-0 draw against Juventus. With Empoli, Vasquez seized the right moment and on Saturday he will show up at San Siro as the third best goalkeeper in Serie A for save percentage (75%) after Di Gregorio (82.6) and De Gea (82.5).

Perhaps it could be an audition of sorts, because the player recently admitted that he is open to the idea of returning, despite a rather strange spell with the Diavolo.