The club has also won the Uefa Super Cup a record five times and domestically, their 18 titles make them the second most successful club after Juventus, who have bagged 27 titles.
Milan owe this aura of invincibility to the famed youth academy that gave birth to sporting luminaries such as Paulo Maldini and Franco Barresi among a host of others.
The youth system comprises nine different age-group teams, ranging from Under nine up to Under-17. To this club, three Zimbabwean youngsters — Simon Solobala (10), Anesu Frensi (13) and Marlven Mudzuka (14) — will go to attend a training camp with a possibility of being signed into the academy.
The one-week long training camp is an initiative of World Wide Scholarship and AC Milan to develop talented players in Italy. The players were selected out of close to 1 500 children by Italian scout and AC Milan Junior Programme technical director, Fabrizio Bobbiesi during a five-day scouting programme last month.
The month of August proved to be special for Solobala, a grade five pupil, for it is the month in which fortune knocked not only once, but twice, at his door.
Solobala who is being raised by his unemployed 57-year-old granny, Felia Solobala, with little help from uncle Richard and mother Lydia, first got a scholarship to study at Kuwadzana 4 Primary School.
While the family was still celebrating having been relieved of the burden of paying his school fees, then came the once in a lifetime opportunity to attend the Milan Junior camp.
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“God intervened. There were many kids and I never thought I would be chosen. I am happy to have been afforded this opportunity and hope to be signed by the club.
“I enjoy playing football and last year I was playing as a goalkeeper, but changed into a striker after my mother bought me my first pair of boots,” said the pencil slim youngster who has become the toast of the rather sleepy suburb of Kuwadzana.
“My coach at Chamisa FC, Douglas Ndlovu and Kuwadzana 4 Primary School sporting director Simba Rudanda helped me very much. It is largely because of them that I have achieved this,” said the youngster.
His grandmother is equally ecstatic. “He just started off playing the plastic ball in the street and God has a way of answering prayers. I was struggling with my grandson’s school fees and he got a scholarship to study at Kuwadzana 4 Primary.
“Then comes this opportunity to play football in Italy. “I am a poor woman trying to raise this child whose father disowned him. I pray that he succeeds where he is going,” said mbuya Felia, who is a member of the Church of Central Africa Presbyterian (CCAP).
Richard, his uncle, believes football is the child’s gateway out of poverty as he is not that good in class.“When he told us that he wanted to go for trials at Churchill High School and needed money, I brushed him aside as I did not have the money.
The organisers wanted US$5 as registration fees and the bus fare for the whole week and I did not have the money, but Rudanda chipped in. We however need assistance in training equipment.“Mr Amos Midzi promised to help us with regards to acquiring his passport as we do not have the money,” he said.
