Against Fiorentina, Tammy Abraham and Fikayo Tomori ‘disobeyed’ Paulo Fonseca’s orders and a report has suggested that serious repercussions could be shown in AC Milan’s next fixture.
From start to finish, Milan’s game against Fiorentina was very poor. The result has reopened conversations, and once again, they are not solely about the manager. Throughout the game, there were several damning moments, and the Rossoneri have a mountain to climb.
Christian Pulisic is the penalty taker, but when Theo Hernandez took the ball for the first penalty, the American did not contest the decision, as Gazzetta dello Sport recalls. After giving away the earlier penalty, the captain wanted to make up for his mistakes, and the winger did not want to undermine the armband. Theo missed, though.
Fonseca questioned the decision from the touchline, and in the dressing room, he reiterated the fact that Pulisic was the club’s penalty taker. Therefore, when the Diavolo were awarded their second penalty of the night, of course, the American should take it.
Instead, Tomori passed the ball to Abraham – who ‘pushed away’ his former Chelsea teammate – and the Englishman missed the third penalty of the game. Again, Fonseca was baffled, at the English duo and his captain for not enforcing his wishes.
As a result of the dismissal, it would not be a surprise to see Abraham and Tomori benched in Milan’s return fixture against Udinese. Fonseca must prove that he has the nerve to make such a big decision, especially with his job being questioned once again.
He needs to put his foot on the ground or they’ll keep disrespecting him
The result v Udinese is less important that making a statement and dropping these players.
If the club can’t back Fonseca to do that; then they may as well sack him now. But nothing will change if they cannot support the coach.
Few decent coaches will want to come and work for this current weak management who won’t stand up to selfish players.
I would remove them for 5 games. Not even on bench and they would train with Primavera or Futuro for 4 weeks, whatever.
And Abraham I understand, he is a striker and he has to push to take the penalty, want to score a goal. It is natural, if he didn’t he would be bad.
But Tomori, coming in and pushing Pulisic out. I would sell him in January or at the end of season. He obviously values his childhood friend Abraham more than his other teammates (and the best Milan scorer at the moment) or the club. He should not be a Milan player after this season. I’m sure West Ham or Bournemouth will pay more than enough for Milan to find a good replacement.
Is there a beaf with Puli and the rest?
This is a problem that Milan management needed to nip in the bud after the Lazio cooling break circus.
Those 2 clowns should have been fined, suspended, properly reprimanded right after the game. By Theo’s interview right after that game it was obvious that he thought he didn’t do anything wrong. The club did nothing and most of Theo and Leao fanboys were blaming Fonseca, while defending Theo and Leao.
That set a bad precedent where the players think they can do whatever they want without any consequences undermining tge coach or hierarchy of the team.
That led to Leao taking the ball away from Pulisic in the Venezia game for the 2nd penalty and giving it to Tammy, even though Pulisic is the designated penalty shooter.
It’s one thing if Pulisic decides to give the ball to another player but is totally different when of the captains on the team takes it away from Pulisic and gives it to Tammy.
Leao is one of the captains that took the ball away from Pulisic on the 2nd penalty vs Venezia.
Theo was the captain that took the ball away from Pulisic on the 1st penalty vs Fiorentina.
Tomori is one of the captains that took the ball away from Pulisic on the 2nd penalty vs Fiorentina.
Tomori was BTW captain in that Lazio game.
The blame is in those 3 “captains” and “leaders”.
Not only are they awful leaders but they have also been 3 of the worst Milan players so far this season.
The club and the coach need to address this issue ASAP and whoever has a problem with that can leave as soon as possible.
No, they haven’t been the 3 worst Milan players this season. You can’t use your angry subjective opinion to evaluate players.
Learn how to read.
It says 3 of the worst Milan players this season, not the 3 worst.
Excellent comment Z
So many problems to address in this team since Zlatan is “the boss”. This management is clownish, that’s it. You can waste your time asking for new scapegoats every week. They’re just the consequences, not the causes.
Just purchase John Duran
I doubt he said anything to them about that on a halftime,otherwise there is no explaination why he didn’t sub both of them as soon as they did what they did…
Who to support….
the players who helped drag Milan back from the brink, delivered a Scudetto and a return to the Champions League including a glorious run to the semi-finals, and who never showed any disciplinary issues in 4-5 years
OR
the man who so far has undone all of that
???
Pioli made them stars, the success went to their heads.
Or Fonseca isn’t doing a very good job….
And whoever sacked Pioli isn’t doing good job either.
Remember that Zlatan said that Théo is happy. No panic, everything is fine.
And don’t you think that senior players who have won the scudetto as you said, who wore the captain armband more than once should lead by example ?
Don’t you think that a player who is a “title winner” as you said, should behave in a selfless way and showing his teammates the way, rather than being handled so carefully in order to accomodate him ? Do you think it’s ok for Theo to shout at referee and confiscate his teammate’s penalty ?
Or better question when did ever Theo and Leao behave as leaders ?
Should Pulisic start to feel anxious and angry and start having bad games, what would you feel ?
Lead by example, that’s something Milan lacks at the very top. Arrogance, greed, PR oriented, failure prone. There were signs for an upcoming downfall.
Instead of those clowns at the top, we should have hired a proper sporting director.
Management 101
Play to players’ strengths and compliment their weaknesses.
Management 102
Don;t rock up and try and replace the club captain with Emerson Royal.
Does that “player’s stength” include their temper tantrums, dips in form and disrespecting their teammates ?
You seem to argue that because Theo and Leao won a title “once” we should reveer them as gods ? Might as well built a temple in Milan for them and bring stuff as sacrifice.
Lautaro Martinez is a multi-title winner, including 2 scudetti, UCL finalist, won titles with Argentina, current captain of inter while having the same age as Theo. He has a dip in form, but do you see the same behaviour from him as from Theo and Leao ? Of course not
Or here is another one, Pulisic is a UCL winner, was decisive against Real Madrid, and won multiple titles with club and country. Yet here is a humble man, tracking back, helping the midfield, working hard,…
It’s Theo and Leao, we just have to find an excuse for them each and every time.
And why do you bring Calabria and Emerson in this ? This has nothing to do with them.
Players/humans lose their tempers, and erm have dips in form….(they are not robots).
As for this whole disrespecting nonsense – were you there???
Theo and Leao and the few other remaining Nineteeners are legends.
Lautaro Martinez is some c##t who plays for the Scum.
I don’t care about their players.
As for Calabria, as I keep saying he was the club captain and Fonseca specifically sought to undermine him (and Gabbia).
And then Ibra declared himself as the only Boss….
Honestly Fonseca is toast.
The question is: should Pulisic ever have a recede in his current amazing form how would we feel about it ?
Could we explain it by his teammates basically alienating him and disrespecting him ? One of those teammates Tomori who was his former partner in Chelsea and prefered the new player ?
If there is now tensions in the locker room between players, whom should we sacrifice ?
This what happens when discipline isn’t enforced and players are allowed to behave as they wish.
So after that happened and he missed both him and tomori should have instantly been subbed and you should have scolded them on the bench
Personally I wouldn’t be afraid to take the heat of my decision if I had a say but if it actually is as described in the article I would fine them both a months wages and bench them at least for a few matches. If that doesn.t sink into their thick skulls and egos then nothing will.
As a side note I’ll rather lose heavily with a bunch of kids that actually works for each other and the team than a bunch of self serving pros who cares most about themselves.
I hope Pulisic gets the full and clear support of San Siro next time we play against Udinese.
Tomori and Abraham should be left out of the match day squad until their behaviour improves. Theo should join them as well. Tomori has been a liability at the back for a long time and the fact that Kalulu is doing so well at Juve suggests that he was the strongest CB in that partnership. Tomori lucked out in being part of the Scudetto winning team imo
I have said this time after time that tomori is not our player at all I advised Acmilan to bench him I prefer Gabbia and Pavlovic/Bartasaghi let’s sell tomori out
There should be High Calibre of Coach for High Profiled Players
Conte…