AC Milan will face an in-form Atalanta side away from home tonight, hoping to show that they have made progress in the past few weeks.
Milan have won their last three games against Slovan Bratislava in the Champions League, Empoli in the league and Sassuolo in the Coppa Italia, having scored 12 goals in the process.
However, Atalanta have won eight on the bounce and are second in the league (they could go top for the time being tonight), while they are also scoring for fun. Thus, it will be a real litmus test.
The predicted line-ups
According to this morning’s edition of La Gazzetta dello Sport (seen below), Paulo Fonseca is expected to go with a defensive line of Emerson Royal, Matteo Gabbia, Malick Thiaw and Theo Hernandez ahead of Mike Maignan.
Tijjani Reijnders and Youssouf Fofana are down as the midfield double pivot pairing which should be no surprise, and Yunus Musah should act on the right as the ‘balancer’ that he has been in recent starts.
Christian Pulisic will have a free-roaming role behind the striker which will be Alvaro Morata, and then Rafael Leao completes the attack on the left flank.
Predicted Milan XI (4-2-3-1): Maignan; Emerson Royal, Thiaw, Gabbia, Theo Hernandez; Fofana, Reijnders; Musah, Pulisic, Leao; Morata.
Predicted Atalanta XI (3-4-1-2): Carnesecchi; Kossounou, Hien, Kolasinac; Bellanova, De Roon, Ederson, Ruggeri; Pasalic; De Ketelaere, Lookman.
So many teams that are doing well right now are going with a 3 in the back and 2 in front and we also played so well when we did it against real and Inter. I don’t get why we are not trying it still
It’s good to see Pulisic centrally as I believe it’s where he is most effective, but are we really playing Musah on the right to protect Emerson’s @ss!
I’d like to know the thinking…if it’s a tactical choice by Fonseca then fair enough, Colombo wasn’t a natural wide man in Sacchi’s team and these moves can often work, you need as many team workers as you do superstars….
With Musah playing it becomes a 4-3-1-2 or 4-3-2-1 and the midfielders should be covering the space in front of the defense better. Counterattacking is the best approach tonight – let’s hope it works!
I like the principle of the formation being fluid and transitioning in match..so long as we aren’t having to carry Emerson. 4312 worries me, it’s narrow and can get overrun with todays formations.
I go with you TonyK, “Counter attacking is the best approach tonight”.
Last season we were mad that we played a draw against them…
This season they are the favorites 🤣🤣🤣
Same approach as agains a strong team – stay compact and counter.