Di Marzio: Milan management ‘sensitive’ to fan criticism and will re-evaluate Lopetegui

Because Pioli is being replaced with, in the immortal words of Mr Burns, his non-union Mexican equivalent.

There are 2 ways to take this thing forward:

1. a tactically innovative young coach at the cutting edge and ideally someone who has demonstrable over achievement in his CV (as it is unlikely this person will have multiple trophies in his CV);

2. a senior coach who is a proven winner / has a pedigree of success at big clubs. This is a matter of degree, at the top of the tree sits Guardiola, Klopp is not far behind and neither is Conte but it could be Sarri.

Whether the coach should be 1 or 2 should come down to: fit for the squad which has been developed; and our budget.

What has happened here is that Zlatan stuffed up the progression to Motta because he wanted to win so it had to be Conte who is a ‘winner’. This was despite the reality that Conte represents a significant reset of the project built for a 4-3-3 / 4-2-3-1. While Conte is a great coach we’d be throwing out much of what has been built to go down the path of Conte. It also then leaves us with a back 3 and wing back system which pretty severely restricts next moves – because that’s the other thing about Conte, he wont be around long. Milan does not have the money for reconstruction of the squad for a back 4 based system should we not like the post-Conte options to continue with his work.

This doesn’t even get to brass tax and whether we can afford Conte and the players he would demand without cannibalizing the good parts of the squad.

So while the brains trust put the freeze on Motta, Giuntoli (a man who has actually built a dynasty from the ground up, which ADL chose not to take advantage of) jumped and threw the weight of Juventus behind an approach to Motta.

Now ADL has jumped because he’s desperate enough to put out the dumpster fire he has created, and Conte appears to be off the table.

This is the real reason we became content with Pioli again because we’ve missed the best available options. Yes I am cynical but remember that it wasn’t really until Juventus emerged as genuine competition for Motta that Milan re-floating the idea of sticking with Pioli (because we’d beat a string of bad teams and teams which were out of form) and it had become apparent that Conte would be a problematic appointment (due to finances, other interest, ect).

The new found appreciation of Pioli did not last longer than the first time Milan was tested by a good squad in a good place (i.e. Roma in the Europa finals). Think about it, all it really took for Pioli to be gone again was 1 loss. That is as much confirmation as you can expect that wanting Pioli again never had anything to do with Pioli. If there was faith in Pioli a few results would not matter.

So now we’re being sold on options who do not represent a progression from Pioli. They’re each as unimpressive as Pioli was when he got the job in the first place or they are pi$$-takes who would not be in contention if they weren’t Zlatan’s buddies.

Motta is everything that we need from the next coach, he can grow with the project while possessing the tactical nous and preparedness and ability to develop young players which is what is required to bring the project to its peak. I assume he has the hunger to prove himself. What better opportunity could he have than to awaken the sleeping Milan giant before cashing in with the more affluent giants i Europe (assuming that the final status quo is substantially maintained).

This has been an absolute clown show but it should not surprise anyone. These people did, after all, sack the directors who ended the banter era and who won the first scudetto in more than a decade to replace them with an accountant, a scout and a guy who has never held a role in football before (other than as a player). Remembering, of course, that it took about 8 months to appoint Zlatan,

In this context, it is absolutely a natural progression to replace the coach with someone who would otherwise be coaching West Ham. He is as equally out of place in the Milan job as the fools who pass for management at the moment.