AC Milan maintained the distance down to Juventus in the standings with a 0-0 draw at Allianz Stadium this evening. However, it was far from a brilliant game and below are the player ratings for the Rossoneri.
If you haven’t already, make sure to check out how we decide the player ratings. From the scale to what affects the rating, we have compiled everything there.
Starting XI
Sportiello (6.5): The goalkeeper actually played well for most of the game and made an incredible stop to deny Juventus what looked like a certain goal. Having just saved a shot, he managed to get up just enough to save the rebound. A mistake which could have been fatal at the end drags down his rating, though.
Musah (5.5): Under the circumstances, it wasn’t terrible from the American but he’s clearly not a right-back. He got beaten too easily at the back and while he had some good runs forward, the final pass/shot was always poor.
Gabbia (6): Juventus found a lot of space in attack but they were always stopped in the final moments. The Italian was decent tonight and ended up making a few good clearances when the home side pushed for a winner.
Thiaw (7 – MOTM): By far the best Milan player on the pitch tonight, for once, as he defended very well in the duels against Vlahovic and wasn’t afraid to keep a high line (intercepting more balls). He also had several crucial clearances in the box, including one off the line.
Florenzi (5.5): Again, we are talking about a player who was out of position, so we must cut some slack. The veteran could have done more when going forward and while he was okay at the back (not always getting help from Leao), Juve did hurt Milan down the flank.
Adli (5): He started the game with a few incisive passes, almost always finding a man open, but then he got very sloppy and misplaced too many passes. Once again, he was also too bold in possession in certain situations when he should have just played a pass.
Reijnders (5): A very quiet performance from the Dutchman with unusual sloppiness in his passing, even when they looked simple. These tactics clearly don’t bring out the best of him. Not enough support in the defensive phase either.
Pulisic (5.5): He was often open on the flank and at least sure to give his teammates some options. However, seeing as Milan rarely arrived with pace, this wasn’t a good game for him and that goes for pretty much the whole attack.
Loftus-Cheek (5.5): The Englishman managed to win some balls back from time to time and had one good shot which went just wide. However, he continues to lack the crucial decision-making as most of his good intentions amount to nothing.
Leao (5.5): One or two good runs, perhaps, but pretty quiet aside from that and he also could have done better in defence. On the other hand, it wasn’t terrible and just like Pulisic, he wasn’t exactly helped by Milan’s way of playing.
Giroud (5): It is very tough for a striker like Giroud in a game like this, facing three strong centre-forwards with little support. However, whenever the cross did get into the box, he continuously occupied the wrong areas despite Leao/Pulisic almost always getting the cross in at the near post.
Substitutes
Bennacer (5.5): Immediately showed that he wanted to play the vertical passes to Leao and two good opportunities arrived, none of which were successful.
Okafor (5.5): We barely saw anything from him, if we’re being honest, and that’s probably due to Milan defending the draw. Forced Juve to concede a corner in the dying seconds which could have resulted in a winner, if that counts for anything.
Zeroli (N/A): We didn’t see enough to give him a rating.
Bartesaghi (N/A): We didn’t see enough to give him a rating.
Chukwueze (N/A): We didn’t see enough to give him a rating.
The manager
Pioli (5): With zero shots on target and many chances conceded, this cannot be considered a positive game even if Milan maintained the distance to Juventus in the standings. The tactics didn’t elevate a single Rossoneri player tonight and that is very worrying.
That rumor linking up Madrid with him again is just what Thiaw needed.
CAN SOMEONE ADVISE ZLATAN IBRAHIMOVIC TO BRING”” ZLATKO DALIC” ” PLEASE
Add “while barcelona’s board of director identify him as the new puyol, madrid seems to be closer and preparing a concrete move”
And boom!
He will enter god mode in our next last 4 games
Adli gives the ball away too often, and in bad spots.
Will you blame him for that? Blame stubborn Pioli who is forcefully playing him out of position.
Yes, I’ll blame him. Why shield him from critics? He deserved all of it.
Some of his misplaced pass and movement under pressure was so unnecessary and showed his technical limitations, even if his vision for pass was good.
It’s Pioli decision for placing him out of position, but his individual mistakes in that position is his fault alone.
Totally agree with you
Sportielllo should be 10, what are you talking about LOL
Overall, bad game but from Thiaw and Marco
This is oilur ceiling guys. This is Pioli’a ceiling
LOL, what does playing out of position have to do with giveaways? Either you make a pass or you don’t, get caught in possession or don’t.
He’s just too ambitious. It’s a fine line between Frustrating Krunic only doing side/backward passes while completing 90% of them and Adli who goes for gold every freaking time. Good mids know when to risk it and when to pass it sideways or back.
Musah suffers from similar things but dribbling. Sometimes he dribbles past 3-4 guys and it’s awesome, more often than not, he holds the ball too long and kills the move.
In my view, experience will teach them. both are young, both are idiots. but both have potential
Rossoneri survive the Old lady night scare!!😂😂
To be honest, I think we couldn’t do more… We saw Juve kids played against men and still outplayed men…. We’ve got a lot to learn meehn…
“The tactics didn’t elevate a single Rossoneri player tonight and that is very worrying.”
That is not worrying. Not anymore. It was worrying for the last 2 years, but with only 4 games left, Pioli’s tactics not elevating any Milan player don’t matter.
Valiant effort by Musah in yet another new position this season.
Good game by Thiaw and Sportiello.
The rest of the game, as expected, was a yawn.
This. Even giving Pioli a rating is superfluous at this point.
What RLC should be doing regularly as an attacking mid, Adli tries to do the same way back from his own half. That should be supported and not criticized. He is at times successful, too. Adli is the no.8 in this team, not RLC.
It’s just that the coach is too dumb to notice that or just doesn’t care.
Anyway Pioli is the person who tries to do the same old stuff a 1000x times expecting a different result.
For what it’s worth we at least managed to keep second place with a 5 points margin heading into what should be theoritically an easy 4 games win. The qualification to the UCL is already officially secured.
In the end we neither managed to beat Juve nor Inter or Atalanta and Roma managed to school us in the EL.
The positive today are Sportiello and Thiaw.
Juve: 13 matches in the league, only 2 wins. And stil keeping that 3rd spot can tell us how bad Serie A is this season. Contrary to what Pioli said over and over again about Inter, I don’t think they do any miracle. They just do what they’re used to do. Beating weaker teams in the current weaker league.
It’s not them that’s greater. But it’s we that’s weaker.
Inter, who are “incredible this season”, who are a “top 3 team in Europe” couldn’t manage to get first place against Real Socieded and got eliminated by Atletico Madrid who also got eliminated.
We don’t have a single Italian team in UCL 1/4, and most of the top dogs (Napoli, Lazio,…) were absolute garbage this season.
This is the current status quo in Italy.
Did you see IFTV’s latest video? Mike and Antonio pretty much said the same thing – Inter won the title “whoopee”… but they really should’ve done better in Europe if they’re that “incredible.” Like you say, Italian football’s just not up there anymore.
I actually thought Mike and Antonio were so petty in that podcast… like little kids trying to find something wrong in an argument… Inter deserves all the praise this season – they ran away with the title.
Exactly. They have the advantage on just being the same (read: stable). Having a fix system is also help.
Exactly. They have the advantage on doing just the same (read: stable). Having a fix system also helps.
Yeah, I agree. More than Inter being strong it is the Serie A being weak. In the EPL against MC I doubt Inter would be able to get the first place. In the UCL this season the team left much to desire. No Italian team is top-quality anymore.
Kudos to the directors as well that seems to find players that can easily replace any outgoing players. Moreover for free. That’s what a decent experience directors can do.
Exactly, IMO I blame the coaches… Italian teams have this stubborn affinity towards Italian coaches, look at the big teams in serie a, almost all of them have Italian coaches… with inferior tactics as compared to coaches from abroad. To put it into perspective, pulisic is a player who has been exposed to three different leagues so far…he has learnt how to adapt and that’s probably why he hit the ground running as opposed to chuk who was the supposed ‘jewel’ of the mercato, despite not playing in his natural position…our coaches lack exposure and that’s why they play stale football with stale tactics, I mean look at pioli and allegri…that’s why I fully support shopping for coaches abroad…more exposure=better tactics, just look at EPL top teams, (except for Arteta) Coaches like lopetegui or de zerbi who you despise might actually come and dominate this league
Zlatko Dalic is all we need
Zlatko Dalic is a world cup finalist, semifinalist and UEFA Nations League finalist.
HE WILL TRUERLY SAVE MILAN
Ugly game.
We did, however draw without one “starter” in our back 5 against the third place team playing in Turin.
We got to see Barts, who looked very good and Zeroli who looked like he is developing.
Leao played pretty stout defense this game and didn’t embarrass the captains arm band.
I’ll take the point.
It’s telling there aren’t even 50 comments yet. Nothing to rage about. Boys brought their lunch pails and got the job done.
Sportiello deserves more than that, Maignian would have let in those near post shots, couldn’t stop clapping for him save after save
RLC did show that it would be better playing him in midfield, he did win almost every tackle & bossed Rabiot of all people, but did nothing upfront
Pulisic waited too many times to think about what he wanted to do,which gave time to juve players to close him down B4 his final touches
Zeroli is a total waste of substitution, he couldn’t tackle, win any ball, pass successfully, just zero all the way
Bartesaghi has sure improved, gave a nice pass to leao & disturbed McKennie a bit
Quite unfair to score musah same as florenzi, with due respect, he did stay with his man & went forward, though,he still lacked shooting abilities, but if he stayed on when chiesa came in, that allowance wouldnt have been there, florenzi made chiesa shining star
Reinders, Giroud, adli were too quiet while leao & gabbia tried but didn’t play to their usual strength, we sure missed Theo today
‘Maignan would have let in those near post shots.’
Thought exactly the same.
Chiesa comes in at 63′, Musah subs off at 82′.
In those 20′ Musah was roasted at wing by Chiesa, not entirely his fault thou as he isn’t a RB by trade. Not much different from Florenzi. That’s why he was subbed off.
I missed that, spot on, probably cos I was being appreciative of musah unlike how we all perceived he was gonna play so bad in that position, thanks
But he’s indeed bad. It’s plain and simple. Never looks natural in that position. He can’t even cross properly. The only that worse than him being in that position maybe the person who keep insisting on trying him on that role.
How can you be critical of Zeroli? It’s like his third appearance, was on for 10 minutes and I think he touched the ball once. You write as if you expected some kind of massive game from us tonight. Lol. We got the result we set out to get, which is a draw, and missing 3/4 of our starting defense plus GK. The season is over. Relax.
Zeroli gets 1 put of 10 from what I have seen from the stands. Slow, clumsy & losing the ball in the midfield. Shouldn’t be playing for Milan.
Zlatko Dalic
ZLATKO DALIC IS BETTER THAN EVERY COACH WE WANT
Okay dude, you’ve said it like 100 times, we got it.
Guys, I think Zlatko Dalic might be the answer to all our problems.
Yeah yeah, just tell dalic to pack his bag
Jesus Christ man! Do you have a mite button?!
I was going to disagree but then you used all caps and that really convinced me that you must be right.
No he’s not, Amorim is better, Motta is better, Arne slot is better
Thiaw was good, but MOTM is Sportiello. Decent performance overall, considering our mental situation and the absentees from our defensive line. LFC should get a higher score as well. Leao and Pulisic not really handling the pressure of the role of leading our attack. Reijnders also disappointing.
On the official app I voted for Sportiello, and over 70% of the fans also voted for him.
They could have beaten us with 3 goals if not for his crucial saves
Dalic isn’t even that good. 0 exp in coaching a top lvl club.
He is rated as Croatia’s greatest coach.
meh. by who? and as i said. once he has proper club lvl exp then we can talk about dalić, until then Kovač is better (for a club), maybe even čačić. Tudor is upcoming and highly rated as well
What about Zlatko Dalic? What was his rating?
We need to remember the suspended players and surprise injury. The guys held on for a draw which at this point in how the season is going isn’t the worst outcome, I was half expecting a 2-0 loss. Now is the time for some experimentation with line ups or even bring in Zaltko Dalic.
The only surprise today is Thiaw. Fantastic job.
Everything else is self explanatory and has been on display for a LONG time. Unable to break down a low block.
I don’t blame the players. I blame Pioli and his inability to improvise. Players don’t know what to do and just pass the ball around side to side.
Pioli again waits until the 80th minute to make subs and bring pace in …
Rinse & Repeat.
Ugly game.
We did, however draw without one “starter” in our back 5 against the third place team playing in Turin.
We got to see Barts, who looked very good and Zeroli who looked like he is developing.
Leao played pretty stout defense this game and didn’t embarrass the captains arm band.
I’ll take the point.
It’s telling there aren’t even 50 comments yet. Nothing to rage about. Boys brought their lunch pails and got the job done.
Sportiello MOTM. Wonder how the game would turn out if it was Mike between the posts. His injury might just be a blessing in disguise.
What an aweful game. First, Juve played like a lower level team away from home. Milan on the otherhand couldn’t break them down. Then Milan seemed to be playing for a tie. Not a bad outcome in terms of staying ahead of Juve. That said, pathetic performance from two supposedly Seria A giants. I put the game on again when ever I want to take a nap.
RLC was anonymous to start with but got much better before he was taken off.
Leao took a long time to adjust to not having Theo with him in attack.
Giroud again provided little.
My main criticism was with Pioli again. Not only for the lineup choices but also how long it takes him to make changes. Again the inform players off the bench get only get fleeting minutes at the end. When we just trying to hold out Juve.
When he has is “plan a” lineup out there; he takes forever to make changes. When it is a rare rotated lineup he subs all the usual players back on at half-time/60th min.
“With zero shots on target and many chances conceded, this cannot be considered a positive game even if Milan maintained the distance to Juventus in the standings.”
Pioli disagree. He has such a low standard.
Can we stop playing RLC as a 10? Apart from his physicality, he didn’t offer much. And for God sake can he turn his body facing the goal before passing the ball?? Not just this game but many game before this too, so many opportunities for a better play his wasted by him.
Sportiello should have gotten motm but thiaw is looking so much better in this game. Adli misplaced too many pass even the simple one. Overall the midfield trio is dreadful to say the least.
Pioli loves the dude. Simple. That inability to see reality or try something else, is what is getting Pioli fired.
This was one of the few games that I watched this season and there was one thing that was as clear as the sun to me:
– Adli was the worst player on the field in my opinion. He is slow, not aggressive and misplaced to many passes.
I understand if people say “he is still young and developing”. If that’s the case then loan him out. Let him develop in another team and come back to Milan ready. Exactly the same strategy that Real Madrid did with Ibrahim Diaz.
“Giroud continuously occupied the wrong areas despite Leao/Pulisic almost always getting the cross in at the near post.”
Or could it be that the crosses were aimed at the wrong places since no one reached them?
“According to reports, Milan were shaken by the strong reaction of fans to Julen Lopetegui rumours and are re-evaluating their choice of coach, looking at Paulo Fonseca.”
Fonseca… Straight savage from the board if true🤣🤣🤣