AC Milan secured a huge win in the Sunday six-pointer at San Siro, beating Roma 1-0 to keep things very tight at the top.
The heroes of the night were Strahinja Pavlovic and Mike Maignan. The former got the only goal of the game as he bombed forward on a counter-attack to meet Rafael Leao’s cut-back, and then the latter stopped Paulo Dybala’s late penalty to preserve the victory.
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Today’s front pages
The result means that there are now four teams separated by one point (Napoli one point ahead of Milan, Inter and Roma) at the top of the Serie A table, and the Italian papers understand the magnitude of the result
La Gazzetta dello Sport: “StraMilan. Allegri beats Roma, three teams one point behind Napoli. A spectacle and missed chances at San Siro. Leao sets up Pavlovic. Maignan saves Dybala’s penalty. Max: ‘This is how self-belief grows’.”
Corriere dello Sport: “On Conte’s back. A whole Scudetto pile. Four clubs separated by one point: Max and Chivu advance. Pavlovic pushes Allegri. Maignan saves a Dybala penalty: Roma beaten (1-0).”
Tuttosport: “Pavlovic-Maignan. Goodbye, Roma. Leao feeds the defender: they’re level in second place, where Inter are also. Dybala saves a penalty: Milan celebrate.”
QS: “Max’s Milan are on a roll. Pavlovic scores, Maignan saves a penalty: Roma beaten 1-0.”
Don’t confuse us with scudetto talk
Hyperbole in the Italian press seems even more extreme than elsewhere. Win a game and ‘Scudetto ambitions’, lose one and ‘here are 15 things wrong with Milan’.
Truth is probably somewhere in-between, which I’m perfectly fine with. Last night, we could have won by two or three or we could have drawn or even lost. These things swing on fine margins. Importantly, we played against a good team, we had spells looking inferior but we adjusted and we were on top for the majority of it. So, on when whole, we played well, didn’t take all our chances and rode our luck at times.
That said, Roma’s non-penalty xG was very low and a lot of the systems seem to be working. Salaemaekers yesterday seemed both right-wing and right-back. The five man defence means Pavlovic going on a chaos-run isn’t suicidal. We’ve got good passers in midfield capable of holding and dictating possession. The gaping hole between our defence and midfield has disappeared. We’ve got some sparks of life from Leao that help to turn games. Some of the younger new players are still settling in but looking to be improving.
It’s great seeing pretty much everyone in the comments being grounded about our scudetto. We all hope, of course, but looks like all of us feel we are still lacking. I’m hopeful though, I still believe Allegri has not been able to field our best 11. Someone is always injured, and yet, we are right in the middle of the fight. Plenty to do, but we are on the right track.
Cool the jets off Scudetto talks. Just arrive in March being either top or within striking distance of the top, and then we’ll speak.
The season after we won the Scudetto, Pioli started like a house on fire with 23 points (7Ws 2Ds 1L) after the first 10 games, and then it all went to heck.
Let’s just make sure we don’t fall into some sort of hole in the next three to four months.