After the loss to Napoli, the Italian media has been heavily critical of the AC Milan frontline. Understandably so, but Massimiliano Allegri has not done the same.
It has been a difficult week for the Milanese forwards. Since Monday, they have been challenged heavily and the press has not been kind to them. The focus has been on their shortcomings and their need to do more.
Even today, suggestions are that the club will now consider parting with Rafael Leao and maybe even Christian Pulisic, if the renewal impasse cannot be sorted. It is a difficult position for the club to find themselves in.
Allegri remains calm
For Allegri, though, it is a time to keep the group together and he refused to publicly attack his forwards. In the dressing room, who knows what was said. Inside his mind, who knows what was thought.
However, Luca Bianchin spoke for Gazzetta dello Sport about his approach and why it is unlikely to change, as MilanNews relays.
“Allegri’s analysis of the match is… Allegri-like: “A game in which there were few chances, one of those games where you knew one incident would decide the match. In the second half, we should have been quicker in shooting on goal. Nkunku had two good chances; someone like him needs to score or at least find the back of the net. We absolutely must improve and stay calm.”
“Does this sound like a dismissal of the strikers? No, don’t think so. Allegri never attacks his players and certainly doesn’t start this time. “I could have maybe decided to break the deadlock earlier, in the 70th minute, but I played it like this: the players need to be in good condition to do that… and unfortunately Rafa has had a lot of physical problems this season.”
“The ending, of course, was sad: Milan only attacked after conceding a goal and never really threatened. Milinkovic-Savic had difficult saves: none.”
Has the attacking play been poor? Yes.
But the fault lies in the set up more than the players to me.
When Milan plays 3-5-2 only Fullkrug is a true 9. And he’s the kind of 9 that needs service. He’s not going to get behind the defense on a counter. Modric is the best ball player but he’s too far back to provide the service a 9 needs.
The rest of them aren’t 9’s so it’s hard to critique them. Everybody would be better in a 4-3-3 played from the start.
Maybe he would first attack Tare and Furlani for bringing in players he didn’t ask for and obviously doesn’t value? And then players? He is planning to stay around for a long time so he knows doing that wouldn’t help that.
He had Vlahovic and kean at Juventus and his team still couldn’t score goals
Ok.
We loss the Napoli game the same way we lost the Lazio game. The problem is the tactics
Also seemed like Max waited waaaayy too long to use the attacking subs. Pulisic in the 74′ and Leao not until the ’82.
I’d like see these guys around the hour mark if you actually expect them to get into the flow of things and make an impact.
It’s frustrating. No real attacking intent whatsoever until after the Napoli goal.
“No real attacking intent whatsoever until after the Napoli goal.”
Because Allegri is afraid of losing so much that he can’t even dare to dream of winning those matches. He was 100% focused on keeping both matches at 0-0. And when has that kind of approach won any team anything? Exactly. Just a loser mentality.