When Malick Thiaw arrived towards the end of the summer transfer window for a relatively low fee, Milan fans would have been forgiven for having moderate expectations.
Fast forward to now, and Calciomercato.com writes how Thiaw has gone from a young prospect who struggled for playing time to two fantastic starts in a row man, against Torino on Friday when he was man of the match performance and one last night against Spurs on his Champions League debut where he should have got the award.
Thiaw was the star of Milan’s victory over Tottenham as he looked surprisingly confident and calm in dealing with the advances of two world class forwards in Harry Kane and Heung-min Son. The 21-year-old was dominant in the air, courageous and timely in pushing up to pressure the ball recipient and decisive in his interventions.
The nearly 75,000 fans at San Siro roared on every smart play that Thiaw made which will fill him with confidence for the coming weeks. For many Thiaw’s performances may come as a surprise, but certainly not for Milan who tried to sign him in the summer 2021 window and then in the 2022 January market.
Two concrete attempts then failed because of Schalke’s exorbitant requests and their desire to keep him for a promotion bid back to the Bundesliga. Last summer proved to be the right moment and the Rossoneri sealed a deal for €6m plus €1m in bonuses.
Just like the Pierre Kalulu deal was, it is beginning to look like brilliant scouting and a potential bargain from an economic point of view. Thiaw, meanwhile, wants a leading after being fifth choice in the pecking order.
The best thing for the Coach to do, is have a 3 man defence Kalulu on the right , Thaiw in the middle, and Timori on the left, it would be amazing…
And then to do what with Simon Kjear?
rotation
It would be a nice line of defense with young talent…
Theo, Tomori, Thaiw , Kalulu
if we need we can have maturity of Simon