Former Milan player and coach Zvone Boban has heavily criticised the Rossoneri management and thinks that Paulo Fonseca should alter the formation he is using already.
Speaking during an interview with La Gazzetta dello Sport (via Calciomercato.com), Boban shared his thoughts on the summer transfer market that did not impress him and the poor start that Fonseca has made to his second spell in Serie A.
In regard to the formation, Fonseca has been favouring the 4-2-3-1 formation so far but Milan are yet to win a game in Serie A.
As far as Boban is concerned, the current Milan squad is much more suited to playing in a 4-3-3 because of the characteristics of the midfielders, especially Tijjani Reijnders and Ruben Loftus-Cheek.
“Unfortunately we are still in court, but for me Milan is always Milan. I really respect the work done by Fonseca at Shakhtar, at Lille and at his beginning at Roma,” he said.
“He has just arrived at Milan and we need to give him time, but what worries me is that he still doesn’t have the understanding that this team can and must play only with 4-3-3. That way the mezzali can provide balance and help to the super offensive wingers like Leao and Pulisic.
“Reijnders can’t play with two in the middle, and Loftus-Cheek isn’t creative enough to play as a number ten. They are two mezzali, they are runners and ball carriers, not real organisers of the game.
“Fonseca is at the beginning, he is intelligent and I hope he can correct himself because beyond the results the problem is the style, which for now doesn’t exist.”
Another criticism of the current setup that Boban has is in regard to Zlatan Ibrahimovic. He doesn’t seem to understand the role that Ibrahimovic plays at the club, a feeling that many people can sympathise with.
Boban warns that Ibrahimovic will be judged a lot more than the other executives at Milan given his name and reputation.
“Zlatan is a genius and I will thank him forever because for the love of Milan he agreed to come back and change the recent history of the Rossoneri and all of us.
“Having said that, now I don’t understand what he does, what his responsibilities are. I hope he understands them because in the end, he will be the one judged, not [Geoffrey] Moncada.
“The fact remains that the team that won the Scudetto and reached the Champions League semi-final was imprudently dismantled, a lot could have been built on those foundations. For me it was a huge mistake.”
Fonseca’s first major personnel issue to deal with has centred on Theo Hernandez and Rafael Leao after they were dropped against Lazio and stayed away from the cooling break huddle.
Boban tried to underplay the incident, saying: “They made a mistake and then changed the game. I hope everything gets sorted out, they’re good guys.”
Simple bitter truth
Watch out, many members here are not ready with all these hard facts and truths.
Regarding the 433 and the midfielder’s characteristic, it seems that the only one who can’t see it is Fonseca himself.
the team that won the Scudetto and reached the Champions League semi-final was imprudently dismantled
Brutal but true
In-experienced and in-competent management.
Yoo man.. that’s truth . The people who bring Milan to the last scudetto slow but sure completely eroded… How big boban love to his former team…
Play 433
Winning team dismantled imprudently
Zlatan is a mouth piece
Thanks Boban for clarifying the basic issues at the club, some are in need of illuminating
Bobi thinks he’s smarter than the Gerry bunch here lol.
There’s a Gerry buch here? Like people actually defending these incompetent clown non-ironically?
Maybe you are better than boban! No wonder you work at the FIFA headquarters…
Are you re*arded?
Obviously Boban knows a lot more than Gerry the clown who doesn’t even know Milan won 7th Champions League which Boban won 1 of the trophy as well won 4 Scudetto with Milan.
Hey Lloyd and Harry, that was sarcasm.
Basically him and Maldini said the same thing. Invest after you have a team close to final of CL and you will stay around that. Instead of that Milan is rebuilding every 2 years. We now have a 2 year ciclus of buying 20M half players of which 2 are good. Out of 10+. 100+M wasted, a top striker costs like that.
That’s what I’ve been saying the whole time, build on the foundation that was made by Maldini and Ricky. How can this club be consistent at the top by thinking numbers and profits
Losing Hakan, Kessie, Gigio and Romagnoli in the prime of their careers counts more as imprudently dismantling a team, not getting rid of old Zlatan, kjaer, Giroud, or those who were trash after the scudetto like Rebic, Krunic, Messias, Kalulu, Bennacer ( unfortunately he is still here).
When it comes to 433. Milan should have switched to that the moment Kessie was lost, since he was the major reason why the 4231 was functional. Tonali and Bennacer without him can’t play in double pivot, especially not Bennacer who was so bad, even lost his spot there to Krunic, the following season.
Let’s be fair, Donnarumma, Hakan and Kessi left because Milan couldn’t give them the earnings they were looking for. Remember the agreement with UEFA due to FFP, and the same was also related to the amount of wages.
That’s true. At this time Milan really can pay gigio for 10m at PSG ?? Haha.. way above that Milan wage budget. Milan must respect due to FFP and some uefa fine. gazidis and his co like Maldini and massara who built & reorganized, but the american clown destroyed it again…
Zoro here really doesn’t like benacer. Every 3rd comment. Bashing benacer 🤣
Bashing?
Just speaking the truth.
I’ll swap him for Rade Krunic and Meite in a heartbeat
Your truth ≠ the truth
Bennacer in double pivot without Kessie, Milan finished 5th in serie A.
In UCL, Milan went thru Tottenham without Bennacer and they were actually playing 3421, not double pivot, because without Kessie the double pivot never worked.
Vs Napoli Bennacer didn’t play in double pivot because as I said , facts, not my truth, lost his spot there to Rade Krunic.
You can check that if you didn’t watch Milan play that season.
“Vs Napoli Bennacer didn’t play in double pivot because as I said , facts, not my truth, lost his spot there to Rade Krunic.”
That’s one way to look at it.
Dude just came on and starting saying how milan finished 5th because benacer was playing.
I mean here. Tonali in double pivot without Kessie, Milan finished 5th.
Milan went through spurs because we were lucky. LUCKY.
Milan went through Napoli because Benny brought balance to the midfield by playing AM and Diaz was on the wings. W0W. Pioli did something right that time. Diaz on the wings. I’m clapping btw.
You’re just throwing out some random information and acting like you’re speaking some truths. You are not. You’re making a joke of yourself.
You dont like Benacer, fine. But your wannabe arguments for it are weak AF.
The whole conversation is a joke. Z,what? Where was Kessie when Milan was in CL semi finals? Warming the bench in Barcelona, right? We passed Tottenham that year with Krunic Tonali. Kessie showed his worth by being shipped out of Barcelona as soon as there was a chance and not a single European club offered anything for him. Nobody. World class, clubs refused to sign him for 15M. lol
Tbh Bennacer really is a shadow of uis former self…
But hopefully we can start to get some result this weekend.
No he isn’t. He was playing hot and cold but the whole midfield is playing hot and cold since October 2023.
Let’s be clear about something
Hakan, Kessie and Gigio were made the highest wage offer that Milan ownership would sanction. They left for better conditions
That is on ownership and one of the reasons Maldini wanted more financial resources
Romagnoli left to join his hometown club after years of loyal service through a dark time when he could have left many times. He was treated with the courtesy he had earned and deserved
You’re right about going the extra mile for some of them, but Donnarumma was simply out of reach. Besides, Maignan is just as good, better with his feet and a better leader. Kessie is in Saudi Arabia because he has no career goals other than making money, which is fine, but it also makes him too expensive.
I agree Gigio wanted too much. Hakan got a little more than we offered, he just wanted Inter. Kessie has an agent who led him astray, but at least we had him to win the Scudetto.
Oh how we miss Kessie!
He is in Saudi Arabia because there was no interest in Europe for him. 0.
Kessié currently earns almost 14M€ a year with Al-Ahli, slightly more than what Rodri is currently earning.
Aside from having to pay a lot of money to get him out of Saudi Arabia, You’ll also have to pay him a huge salary. And no team who can actually afford that money actually needs a player with the charactestics of Kessié.
Kessié could have stayed with the Catalans but was unhappy there.
Giroud has scored 17 goals and gave 9 assists last season, more than any player within the club, thank god we didn’t get rid of him as you would have liked us to do.
I would have liked us to sell Gigio instead of letting him go for free, but getting Maignan is the best deal we managed to do.
Romagnoli lost his starting spot anyways.
If I’m following you correctly, by the summer of 2023 you wanted us to get rid of both Bennacer (whom you seem to geniuly hate), Krunic and I suppose Tonali as well (since we gonna lose him anyways). In other words, revamp the entire midfield. That’s a lot and perhaps too many changes in a single summer.
@Z you have to admit, that Ibrakadabra is right. Donnarumma, Hakan and Kessi left for better contracts elsewhere. Giroud has been excellent right until his last match for ACM.
No dude. What counts is the real objectives: what team they (MM) received and what team they delivered.
Regardless of who MM brought/sold/left for free, they transformed a mid table team to Champions, a team which was not even playing to Europe to CL semi-finalist.
That’s what counts, that’s how directors are judged above everything else. So you can go hysteric as much as you want about Dona and Kessie (the other 2 never had a market at that time – especially Roma with 6m contract) but the truth is that MM (and Boban) did incredible work, over-achieved, exceeded any possible target they were given – and all that, with limited budget.
True, and they hardly got a thanks on the way out.
Well… Lots of truths said. But Pulisic a super offensive winger? LOL. The guy defends more than the 3 other attacking players on the pitch combined!
Well he can be supper offensive while defending more than the 3 other guys (and it’s not like Leao and RLC are a good reference for defending).
And I do think that a more balanced midfield that will free him more is definetly better for us.
“He has just arrived at Milan and we need to give him time, but what worries me is that he still doesn’t have the understanding that this team can and must play only with 4-3-3″
“Reijnders can’t play with two in the middle, and Loftus-Cheek isn’t creative enough to play as a number ten. They are two mezzali, they are runners and ball carriers, not real organisers of the game.”
“Having said that, now I don’t understand what he [Zlatan] does, what his responsibilities are.”
“The fact remains that the team that won the Scudetto and reached the Champions League semi-final was imprudently dismantled, a lot could have been built on those foundations. For me it was a huge mistake.”
“They [Theo and Leao] made a mistake and then changed the game. I hope everything gets sorted out, they’re good guys.”
That’s too much truth spoken at once.
This is simply the summary of Milan at the moment
If the management are humble to take his advice they will surely be on the road for great things
He is right on every point. Firing Maldini and Massara and selling Tonali sent a message that the owners know nothing about football or don’t care about football. Losing Diaz and Krunic were also bigger blows than people realize, especially with no replacements brought in. Of the signings made, we have four players (Okafor, Reijnders, RLC, Musah) who we don’t know what positions they were brought in to play, even after a whole season!
Play 4.3.1.2 this is the best for formation
Who’s going to be the attacking midfielder? Even a FIFA player knows that also we lack attacking depth for this formation.
Leao of course!
Reijnders. That is literally the only position where he can play for Milan. Anywhere else he is a Torino player.
Boban spitting truth
No 4-3-3 is our best formation because we usually loose ball on opponent at the End will be trashed so I advised Fonseca to play the 4-2-3-1 and changed the attacking midfield department
We lack playmaker genius. We don’t have enough natural CDM. It’s a set up for failure. You’re forgetting how instrumental Diaz was in that formation.
Bobi spitting truth without a filter as usual. Respect to you legend.
Zvone was the king of cool back in the day. Razor intelligence, a fighter, tactically & technically Top , Top level. He would Boss the midfield , always influential against Inter.
His only flaw was his temperament, getting red cards , very hot headed.
A Milan legend.