AC Milan head coach Paulo Fonseca seems to have settled on the team that he will field tonight against Lecce, and he will keep almost all of the XI that won the derby.
According to this morning’s edition of La Gazzetta dello Sport (seen below), Fonseca will field the same defence of Emerson Royal, Matteo Gabbia, Fikayo Tomori and Theo Hernandez ahead of the goalkeeper Mike Maignan.
The change will come in midfield given that Alvaro Morata is not at 100% and is thus expected to start on the bench. There will therefore be a switch back to a more obvious 4-2-3-1 after the successful derby experiment, with Ruben Loftus-Cheek taking the Spaniard’s place.
Youssouf Fofana and Tijjani Reijnders will remain in the engine room as the double pivot and the rest of the side will also stay the same, with Christian Pulisic on the right wing, Rafael Leao on the left and Tammy Abraham up front.
It seems quite an obvious ploy from Fonseca to try and build on the victory over Inter with continuity rather than rotating heavily, despite the fact a game against Bayer Leverkusen in the Champions League beckons next Tuesday.
Predicted Milan XI (4-2-3-1): Maignan; Emerson, Gabbia, Tomori, Theo Hernandez; Fofana, Reijnders; Pulisic, Loftus-Cheek, Leao; Abraham.
Predicted Lecce XI (4-4-2): Falcone; Dorgu, Gaspar, Baschirotto, Gallo; Morente, Ramadani, Coulibaly, Banda; Krstovic, Rebic.
I’d prefer to see Okafor in the second striker role that Morata occupied against inter. He’s used to playing that role and it’s gives us the 442 option going forwards
Totally agree. If morata is unavailable, I think Okafor is the best choice for that role.
Sounds like a great idea!
yup, promote Traore until January and wait for his development until summer… shift Okafor to supporting striker. Get J.David and Ricci, with funds from RLC and Bennacer sales
And get Haaland with the funds from the Origi sale and we’ll be all set…
hahahahahaha you sir, have made my morning. Thank you.
With Bennie’s injury and RLC’s form, we’d get peanuts for them, let alone funds to buy either one the players mentioned.
he’s hurt.
This is completely idiot choice
RLC again as AM
Tijj again as CDM
My oh my…
This milan give me illness
I said here many times, fonseca can thank me later, we need to play 2 forwards. No place for winger in serie A. Most of the team use 3 CB.
What would we expect from lone striker? 3 vs 1 is totally imba. Even haaland will kill himself if he is in our team. No creative mid whatsoever.
Leao is too busy pulling rabbit from his sleeve.
Just stick with 442 ffs.
Jimenez/terraciano as LB
Theo/chucky on LM as we need crosser. Not inverted winger (those words are painful just to be typed)
Puli on RM
Okafor/jovic + tammy upfront (given morata is in need of a rest)
And they are tall enough to receive any crosses!
This is GDS.
No now let rejnder play as attacking midfield why Loftus cheek should play as defensive midfield other wise we will lose possession
We could still do 4-4-2 with Pulisic as second striker and Chukuweze as RM, but I don’t think that’s right, necessarily. Pulisic has played left inside forward before and also played false 9, so he’s done it, but I don’t love it.
What I want to see is more rotation. It’s a long season and we can’t afford not to rotate. I want Musah to get at least 30 minutes, if not a start. And I want him in the pivot, not up front. Up front and central he’s problematic. He can destroy defensively and carry the ball forward. Quick decision-making in the final third is a big weakness.
I think I might start with the shown lineup, more or less, except Reijnders further up the pitch, but then I want to sub off Fofana, Reijnders, and Pulisic at 60 minutes, then Tammy at about 70. Bring in Musah, Chukuweze, Camarda, and Pavlovic and switch to back 3, after you’re up 2 goals+. No reason why we can’t bring in Jovic for Leao late as well, maybe play 3-5-2 with Chukuweze at WB. We need to work on a back 3 variant, because right now we seem to be deepest at CB and it give us more flexibility when we want or need to rotate more because of injury. We don’t have a real 6, so that’s what we need to do when we’re ahead. We’ve seen it just a little bit, always very late, but I see no reason not to bring it out earlier if we’re up 2 goals at the 60 minute mark.