Leeds to take on AC Milan at Lansdowne Road
Pre-season club friendlies are returning to Lansdowne Road, with a meeting between newly-promoted Leeds United and Italians AC Milan set lined up for Saturday, August 9.
Leeds have a major support base in Ireland and are revelling in their return to the Premier League having recently won the Championship with 100 points.
It hasn't been such a memorable season for the Italian giants. They were knocked out of the Champions League in a February playoff by Feyenoord, beaten by Bologna in last week's Italian Cup final and sit ninth in Serie A heading into this weekend's final series.
Fans at the 51,000-seater Dublin 4 venue are likely to see a new manager in charge of The Rossoneri, with former Chelsea boss Maurizio Sarri favourites to take over as part of a major shake-up.
Former FAI chief executive John Delaney proclaimed glamour friendlies as central to the revenue model around funding their share of the reconstruction costs.
Although Manchester United opened the rebuilt stadium in 2010 before a bumper crowd by hammering a League of Ireland selection, the subsequent multi-year quadrangular Dublin Super Cup concept flopped.
The most recent pair of friendlies in 2023 produced mixed turnouts. A mere 28,241 attended the pre-season warm-up between Celtic and Wolves but the fixture between Manchester United and Atletico Bilbao – during which United's Harry Maguire was booed – sold out.
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