AC Milan will play their final Serie A game before the international break tonight as they take on Fiorentina at the Stadio Artemio Franchi.
Milan are looking to make it four league wins in a row and put the midweek defeat to Bayer Leverkusen in the Champions League behind them. You can read our preview for the latest team news, stats and some opposition insight.
Rafael Leão likes a goal against Fiorentina, in fact he has scored four goals against them in Serie A, including his first goal in the competition (29 September 2019 at San Siro). Only against Lecce has he has scored more (five goals) in the competition.
Furthermore, the Portuguese international has scored in each of his last three league matches against La Viola but has never managed to score in four consecutive matches against a single opponent in Serie A. Lucas Martinez Quarta – a player Milan were actually linked with – will play on the right side of a back three for Raffaele Palladino’s side and will try not to get beaten in isolation by the winer.
On the other flank, Christian Pulisic has continued to show his importance to Milan. He has scored in his last three Serie A matches but has never scored in four consecutive games in his career in the ‘top five’ European Leagues (he also scored in three matches in a row between October and November 2019 with Chelsea).
He is likely to come up against Cristiano Biraghi, a veteran defender who has predominantly played as a full-back in his career but now at 32 years of age he has made the transition to being a left-sided centre-back for Fiorentina.
Moise Kean will lead the line for La Viola, and Milan are the only team against which he has already scored with two different teams in the Italian top-flight (17 December 2017 with Hellas Verona and 6 April 2019 with Juventus). His duel should be against Fikayo Tomori, who seems to have settled into a pairing with Matteo Gabbia well and has been a bit more consistent of late.
In midfield, there will be a rather strange battle between Youssouf Fofana and Yacine Adli, two French midfielders who play completely different roles within the double pivot. It could be argued that Fofana’s arrival from Monaco is what pushed Adli out of the door given he was bottom of the hierarcy anyway, but he is getting more chances with Palladino.
Finally, it will be an interesting contest on the right side between Robin Gosens and Emerson Royal. The former is back in Serie A after a spell in Germany and he has taken up a spot at wing-back the position that he excelled in for Atalanta with his athleticism and creativity.
Emerson meanwhile is still looking to find some consistency after some difficult early outings for the Rossoneri, and this will be a good test because he will also have to keep tabs on Albert Gudmundsson.
You just had to talk about Adli even when he is no longer a third sub in Milan squad. And you had to talk about him in the “Key battles” section despite the fact that Adli played just 63 min. in total this season. Of course, such a huge, key battle! Well done! Great peace!
Mandragora is injured so Adli will play
Any decent winger can cause us problems when playing against Emerson Royal.
As for Adli who will indeed start today not because he is ahead in the pecking order at Fiorentina but because the starter is injured, Fofana is a far superior player.
I hope we get an early lead and allow younger players to come in and play the last 20 minutes of the game.