in july 2001, laursen was loaned out to serie a rivals a.c. milan, who needed depth in their squad. he started out strong for his new club, scoring two goals in the first four rounds of the 2001–02 serie a season, and played 22 league games in his first season with milan. milan decided to buy him in the middle of the season for a fee of 21.5 billion lire (€11,103,823). in the summer 2002, milan bought italian international defender alessandro nesta, and laursen's playing time diminished to a combined 20 league games in the next two seasons.