The AC Milan management have faith in head coach Stefano Pioli to get through what is a difficult moment for his side, a report claims.
According to this morning’s edition of La Gazzetta dello Sport (seen below), Milan will move forward with Pioli and the post-Paris Thursday made it clear above all that the club do not question a coach who has experienced another night of disruption.
Milan have put their trust in Pioli and use logical reasoning: in Paris, against a team that spends much more and is decidedly stronger, it could happen that they lose. However, a response is expected against Napoli on Sunday.
Yesterday the team only underwent therapy, today and tomorrow they will begin to prepare for the third edition of the Juve-PSG-Napoli triptych, which seriously risks ending with zero points, zero goals scored and thus zero faith from the fans.
On social media fans have expressed their displeasure at the last two results and some even want Pioli removed from his position as head coach, so the relationship seems to be on a slippery slope, but a win against Napoli could change things.
Against PSG, Pioli once again chose to attack and defend with a high line, accepting the risk of having to manage many one-on-ones at the back. The team were stretched, disjointed and PSG feasted.
Against Mbappé, Dembélé and Kolo Muani, was it worth taking this type of risk? Was it right to give a team with many fast and technical players the chance to beat the press and run into space?
Pioli chose this way because he has been training the team in this way since July and because a more defensive approach – low block, systematic doubles, ten players behind the line of the ball – is not in the DNA of many players who arrived in the summer.
With the benefit of hindsight, however, it is easy to reach a logical conclusion: it didn’t work in Paris. And now? In short, tactics were the theme of the day and even some players in the dressing room talked about it.
They know well that PSG-Milan, less traumatic than the derby, has re-proposed some themes of Inter-Milan: the high aggression, the stretched team, the one-on-ones, the insertions of the mezzali the attacking difficulties which in this story have a role.
Pioli is now called upon to find a solution, less extreme than last winter’s emergency 3-5-1-1. Obviously, the players will also have to help him. The attackers, who no longer score goals. Theo Hernandez, who without his mentor Maldini and his friend Brahim Diaz seems lost in his ups (few) and downs (many).
The locker room relationships, however, seem less topical. In the night between Wednesday and Thursday there was a lot of talk about the back and forth between Davide Calabria, who is the captain of this team, and Pioli.
Calabria’s main sentences on television after the match: “We were perhaps so unbalanced, we accepted the one-on-one. Psychological or tactical problem? A little and a little. In certain situations we were perhaps a little too open.
“Tactically they were better placed on the field than us. We’ll fight for it, it’s difficult but those who don’t believe in it can stay at home, we believe in it.
“We have to go to work at Milanello, anyone who doesn’t want to work hard is better off staying at home.”
That particular sentence did not go down well with Pioli: “Davide was wrong, Nobody works at Milanello with little attention or little willingness.”
On Sunday evening in the game against Napoli a response becomes fundamental, more for the environment than for the standings. Milan are second, one point behind Inter, and on Monday they will have already played against all the candidates for the Champions League places, excluding Atalanta and Fiorentina.
