AC Milan will take on Juventus at the Allianz Stadium this evening with a defensive emergency to battle, and head coach Stefano Pioli seems to have settled on his selection choices.
There is once again a rearguard crisis for Pioli to try and navigate, one that begins with the injured centre-back duo of Simon Kjaer and Pierre Kalulu who are not expected to make the trip.
Things were made worse by what happened towards the end of the Inter game, with Fikayo Tomori picking up his fifth yellow card and thus a one-match ban before Theo Hernandez and Davide Calabria got straight red cards.
According to La Gazzetta dello Sport (seen below), Pioli is expected to field a back four of Yunus Musah, Malick Thiaw, Matteo Gabbia and Alessandro Florenzi in front of Mike Maignan, with Musah at right-back and Florenzi on the other side.
Tijjani Reijnders should be partnered with Yacine Adli in the midfield double pivot, and Ruben Loftus-Cheek will take up an advanced role.
Christian Pulisic is down as the right winger, Rafael Leao – who will captain the side – will be on the left and Olivier Giroud will lead the line.
Luka Jovic will miss the game due to injury, which leaves Noah Okafor and Samuel Chukwueze as the players available to come off the bench in attack.
Probable Milan XI (4-2-3-1): Maignan; Musah, Thiaw, Gabbia, Florenzi; Adli, Reijnders; Pulisic, Loftus-Cheek, Leao; Giroud.
Probable Juventus XI (3-5-2): Szczezny; Danilo, Bremer, Gatti; McKennie, Alcaraz, Locatelli, Alcaraz, Cambiaso; Chiesa, Vlahovic.
I genuinely think that pioli hates chukuweze
And Terracciano
Terracciano should start as LB, Florenzi RB. Why Pioli starts with a midfielder as RB? Ridiculous.
Musah at RB ??!! WTF is wrong with Pioli, we have Terraciano, Bartesaghi etc and we are putting Musah there ?? And why play Giroud again, has been off form for months now, is he blind, play Okafor FFS and put Camarda on bench and Chukie, what does he need to do to play…..the definition of madness is making the same mistakes again and again and again and again.
Play 3 at back, use wing backs and play Chukie
Maignan
Simic (caldara), thiaw, Gabbia
Florenzi, Reijnders, Adli, Terraciano/Barts
Chuk, Oka4, Leao
Captain Gabbia……def not Leao
Hey guys this is just a probable formation…..not confirmed by Pioli
Chukwueze is just fitting in….Pioli has given him full matches opportunities and how does he hate him?
It really seems like hate. Cause he deserves to play more now. When pulisic deserved to play more he was givien the opportunity but now he is not in form. Why such an I’ll mannered approach to coaching. Well let’s wait to confirm if this is how the team will take shape today
Square pegs into round holes again……
What do you have to lose, Stefano? Don’t be afraid. Start Terra. Drop RLC deeper. Play puli at the 10 and Chuk on the RT. Start OK4.
Then bring in whoever after the first half… Start on the strong foot.