AC Milan will play their final away game of 2025-26 against Genoa on Sunday, and it is their most important match of the season.
After a run of two wins in eight games, Milan have gone from being in the Scudetto discussion to on the verge of dropping out of the top four. Nevertheless, they have their fate in their own hands: win their last two games and they will secure a Champions League spot.
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The lunchtime kick-off against Genoa is a tricky one for a number of reasons, and not just because Daniele De Rossi would love to help out his beloved Roma. Massimiliano Allegri must rally the troops and get them over the line, or a huge summer upheaval seems certain.
Genoa vs. AC Milan: Five key battles
If Milan are going to win this game they are going to have to score (shocking, right?) and it is about time that the forwards helped out. Massimiliano Allegri will put his faith in Christopher Nkunku from minute one, who should come up against the talented young Italian defender Alessandro Marcandalli if he drifts more to the left.
Nkunku has scored six goals for Milan in Serie A this season, as many as he managed across his two previous Premier League campaigns with Chelsea combined. Only Christian Pulisic (one goal every 194 minutes) boasts a better minutes-per-goal ratio than the Frenchman, and he did well off the bench against Atalanta, so must look to back it up.
At the other end, Lorenzo Colombo is Genoa’s top scorer with seven league goals to his name. His permanent move was recently confirmed after survival was achieved, and he would no doubt love to remind his boyhood club Milan what they are missing out on, having had their own struggles in the No.9 position this season.
Colombo will come up against a player he no doubt had many battles with in training at Milanello over the years: Matteo Gabbia. In fact, it was the striker who got the better of his compatriot in the last meeting between the sides at San Siro, scoring the opening goal for the away side before Rafael Leao’s late equaliser.
If Milan’s forwards are once again unable to get firing, then it might be up to Adrien Rabiot to take matters into his own hands from midfield. The Frenchman is the top scorer in 2026 and has provided some valuable goals from the left of the midfield three. His size and his experience are also very useful in the heat of the battle.
His opposite number is Ruslan Malinovskyi, who has been a consistent source of production all season for Genoa. His six goals and three assists in the league demonstrate that the Ukrainian likes to get into forward areas and can be a real weapon in transition, one that Milan will have to look out for.
Mikael Ellertsson has been one of the players that both the previous coach Patrick Vieira and the current one De Rossi have relied upon. The 24-year-old has made 34 appearances of which 29 were starts, usually operating as a right wing-back in the three-man defence. He has a couple of goal contributions, usually focusing more on helping in the defensive phase.
Milan’s left wing-back with be Davide Bartesaghi. The young Italian had a meteoric rise towards the end of 2025 but this calendar year he has struggled a bit more, and understandably so given his playing time and need to develop. Could he provide a vital goal or assist that gets his team a top four spot?
We concluded with another midfield battle, this team one at a bit longer distance: Morten Frendrup against Ardon Jashari. Frendrup has been Genoa’s metronome in the middle of the park for some time now and has frequently been linked with big moves, however he will be in the control room for De Rossi today.
Jashari is expected to be given another opportunity as a regista after a disappointing start against Sassuolo which saw him benched against Atalanta. The belief in the Swiss remains after his big-money arrival from Club Brugge, but what a time this would be to begin repaying the faith with a dominant display.
