Peppe Di Stefano has shared an interesting background on the difference between Stefano Pioli and Massimiliano Allegri, with the latter opting to do things fully his way.
Pioli achieved a lot of success during his five-year spell at the club, winning the Scudetto in 2021-22 and reaching the Champions League semi-finals in 2022-23. In the end, however, he and the club arrived at a natural farewell.
Milan then tried their luck with some foreign managers, namely Paulo Fonseca and Sergio Conceicao, before going back to the Italian route with Allegri. So far, with the Scudetto race very much alive, it has been a successful move for the club.
Different decisions made
There have been some big changes since Allegri arrived, above all the playing style with can only be described as Corto Muso. As the manager has said many times, it’s not about entertaining everyone, the most important thing is collecting the points.
In an interview with MilanVibes, Sky Italia’s Peppe Di Stefano discussed the changes at Milan and mainly the differences between Pioli and Allegri. While the former opted not to do what he really wanted, the same cannot be said for the current manager.
“Milan are playing much less in attack than before. Pioli’s Milan created a lot, it was an attacking game whether they won, drew or lost. I remember an interview with Pioli when he said ‘I wanted to win 1-0’, but he understood that with this team, you need one more goal than the opponent.
“It doesn’t work like that with Allegri. He said it right from the start, ‘we first need to defend our goal, then we will score’. Milan are playing a very careful and pragmatic style of football in the defensive phase.”
Pioli and Milan didn’t come to a ‘natural end’.
He finished 2nd, that was deemed ‘not good enough’ by the owners and some fans, the club fired him and replaced him with two managers who dragged the club down to 8th and alienated some of the key players.
How come a manager gets sacked for finishing 2nd but the directors are up dragged the club down to 8th don’t face any consequences?
Pioli himself said he lost the team in April.
Some of the “key” players alienated showed themselves part of the problem.
It is important to look at the complete picture rather than bemoan every change and mistake. Without mistakes learning cannot take place. If we are not a learning org then we are losing to one.
Clearly learning took place from the many mistakes last year.
It’s not the results that’s problematic but Pioli have to go so the team can improve. In fact he should have gone earlier when some players were dissatisfied with him. When the new coach coming in, all know that scudetto is probably out of reach and maintaining the CL spot is the objective, well until the objective keep decreasing as time goes by.
Pioli was babysitting both Rafa and Theo. It’s fine having favorites as a coach but Pioli was overdoing it. Mr. on the other hand is treating everyone on an equal platform, he has favorites on every position from goal to striker and has the whole team moving as one unit. And I’m thoroughly enjoying games nowadays.
Pioli got sacked for losing 6 straight matches to Inter and the team not showing signs of improvement.
Ist not about entertaining everyone, Yes we can See it every week and thats definitely not the right way, for me i often stop watching After first halfe because every other game is more entertaining then allegri ball. Maybe you bring a cb somewhen to be able to Play 4-3-3
I think we were in no position to play entertaining football, we needed instant imoact and we got it. The only better choice would have been Fabregas. To gonfeom where we were to possible title contenders where in reality the hooe was to wualify for CL its a huge achievement. We tend to forget we only lost 1 game this season
There will never be three attacking players under Allegri. He only wants to place two at the top; as long as they can interact with each other, chances will be created. His ball game is focused on defending, putting three at the top is just going against his core values.