Rafael Leao’s missed chance during the game against Newcastle United on Tuesday night continues to attract scrutiny from the Italian media.
La Gazzetta dello Sport (seen below) recalls that in the 34th minute of the game against Newcastle, Leao darted into the box as he does so often and when he beat two men with his silky dribbling, the end result seemed a formality.
However, instead of taking on the shot with his favoured right foot, he for some reason decided to try a reverse back heel and he stumbled over, much to the disbelief and annoyance of the 65,000 fans there.
As per the paper, the mistake brought to mind the absurd back-heel with which Mario Balotelli with Manchester City 2011, when he tried to score with a back heel all alone in front of the LA Galaxy goalkeeper. A furious Roberto Mancini took him off.
In May 2022, in Turkey, Balotelli tried a right-footed rabona instead of the comfortable left-footed diagonal finish when his team Adana were already comfortably winning (they ended up 7-0 victors) and Mario had already scored four times.
On Tuesday at San Siro, however, the context was more dramatic from a sporting point of view. It was the Champions League. Milan were unable to score and the draw risked immediately complicating qualification.
There was absolutely no point in trying such a trick, especially a player who has been a leader of the attack from a numbers standpoint and is guaranteed €35m in the next five years thanks to his renewal.
The most disheartening moment was not Tomori’s scolding on the pitch or the dark faces of his team-mates and coaches in the dressing room, but the MVP award awarded to him by UEFA.
Rafa’s entire family was present at San Siro for the game. Perhaps it was for them that he wanted to score that unforgettable goal, with a back heel.
Leao is now 24 years of age, and while he is not exactly old, time passes quickly. At 20, Jude Bellingham has already signed for Real Madrid. At 24, Kylian Mbappè has already won a World Cup final in which he scored and lost another when he scored three.
There is no way that, at 24, a talent like Leao can be out of the 30 candidates for the Ballon d’Or. Perhaps Tuesday’s poor impression will give him the right push to make a turning point, with a battle against Mbappe on the agenda in the coming weeks.
LAKAKA
I though he was the Serie A MVP and won the title at 22. I guess that is nothing. Yes, he needs to improve even more, but the article is written like he never did anything.
GDS there, completely ignoring the fact that along with the English tabloids, they are pretty much responsible for turning Balo’s life into a media circus. He did some stuff that a ‘model footballer would never do, but ultimately it was the press who created his ‘flawed genius’ persona.
And now this. Leao makes one terrible decision and suddenly his career is on the same trajectory? Not only that, but we learn that if he was any good he’d have left us by now. Wow, that’s a revelation!!!!
Unsurprisingly I was not that keen on the transfer (like most transfers) of Balotelli.
But at the time I had a particularly dim view of him. I hadn’t really watched him play an actual game so my entire knowledge of him was based on his media persona.
When I first saw him play for Milan against Udinese I was shocked. It was a completely different player to the one the media had portrayed him as. He went on that season to drag Milan into 3rd place scoring 12 goals in 13 games.
As I watched him play more and more for Milan and Italy I noticed how the media would constantly misread his body language and attitude. When he was clearly getting angry at himself he’d be criticised for getting angry at his team mates. In fact the thing the media missed the most was that Balotelli actually took himself too seriously. He put too much pressure on himself believing the hype of the media.
Leao could face a similar fate. But he really needs to stop with the back heels. Balotelli never did that at Milan.
PS How is trying a ribona when you’ve already scored 4 goals in a 7:0 thrashing in any controversial???
Which back heels? How many of those did he try and fail? You need to stop doing the same stupid thing, making up things that don’t exist.
Btw. Leao – 2 goals and 2 assists in 4 matches. Horrible.
1 assist. If you’re going to accuse other people of making things up, you shouldn’t immediately follow that with your own fabrication.
He wins the title, carries the team to semi finals of CL, where he was responsible for going through twice. Alone. But he is a bad player because he tried a backheel after he went by 2-3 players. I think you have to an id**t to even attack him. Honestly. That is what I think of any articles that are focusing on how Leao was bad when he had 2 wrong moves in the whole game. 😀
The problem isn’t the back heel; that’s not so worrisome. The fact that he couldn’t pick himself up afterwards is what worries me much more. A true champion needs to be unphased by his mistakes, shrug everything off, and continue like the match just begun.
This!! I’m dissapointed with the back heel failure but what makes me furious was his attitude for not quickly recover but laying there like a mor*n.
Seriously, get off this kid’s case already. He was most likely just exhausted from running up and down the pitch, he just dribbled 3 Newcastle defenders in the box, the ball slipped a little away from him and he didn’t have the energy to get around and finish it. I don’t think he was trying to show off. Stupid media is going to drive away our best player. He still creates most of this team’s offense. He is an exceptional talent. Sometimes great players try to pull off things other players wouldn’t and sometimes they don’t work. Even Zlatan would be guilty of this sometimes. Nobody was complaining when he hit that overhead kick for a goal.
“ball slipped a little away from him ” huh??? He backheeled the ball onto his own foot. Smh. All he had to do was place the ball into the net, he was already facing goal but thought the highlight reel goal would have been better and get more attention as goal of the round. Let’s call it for what it is. No one is saying he doesn’t contribute to the team but these things need to be cleaned up in his game. Do that when we’re like 2-0 up or something, not when we need a goal and after we’ve missed so many shots
I hadn’t realized it was a backheel attempt until afterwards. Thought the defender tackled him. But this is much much worse 🤦♂️😂
Showboating and not even in a winning position, what more can I say
Yeah, this is bs. He had two good chances to shoot that he passed up looking for a better chance. That in itself isn’t unforgivable. Dribblers dribble and you take the bad with the good. But trying that idiotic backheel instead of laying it off to Chukwueze once the chance was gone shows a real lack of maturity and professionalism that is concerning.
People talking like Leao plays for free at Milan. Isn’t he a paid professional? Why should he try such after the humiliation at weekend? All players ought to have their killer instincts at their peak, which most did. These games come once in a lifetime, and though it may just seem like one match against Newcastle, it could alter the trajectory of his entire career. Would he try that if Mou or Pep was his coach??? Never!!!!! They’d bench him for 8 games.
That boy ought to be benched for three straight games, let noah be given a chance or pulisic played in that wing.
Nonsense!!!