Giroud insists Milan are ‘ready to fight’ vs. Juventus and must ‘turn the page’ from Spezia loss

By Oliver Fisher -

Olivier Giroud has fired off some words of encouragement to his AC Milan team-mates ahead of Sunday night’s game against Juventus at San Siro.

Giroud spoke during an interview that was published in this morning’s edition of il Corriere dello Sport, and the French centre-forward began by speaking on the effect that Zlatan Ibrahimovic has on the rest of the team.

“Zlatan is the engine of the team. He is demanding especially with the young players, but also with the others. He always wants to do well because he is at the top physically and demands the same from the others. It is important both on the pitch and in the locker room. All together we aim to reach the top,” he said (via MilanNews).

There has been all kinds of fall out after the mistake made by the referee Marco Serra as he blew for a foul on Ante Rebic instead of playing an obvious advantage, with his whistle happening at a simultaneous moment to Junior Messias curling in what surely would have been a winning goal in the 92nd minute before Emmanuel Gyasi stole all three points. Giroud is not worried about any hangover from that.

“We must not lose confidence in ourselves or be assailed by fears and doubts because we lost a match that we had to win at home. Juventus I want to see Milan again, generous, determined and ready to redeem themselves immediately. Okay, we fell badly, but we are ready to fight, as they say, with a knife between our teeth,” he said.

“The referee immediately realised he was wrong: he apologised and you could read on his face that he was sorry. Unfortunately, yes it was a game situation that happened and we can’t do anything about. We had to win but instead we lost the 2-0 and we did not succeed.

“Now it is necessary to use this frustration that has remained within us to do well with Juventus. We no longer want to experience such a bad feeling and it is up to us not to make certain mistakes again.”

The match against Juventus certainly carries an extra meaning for a couple of reasons, given that the Bianconeri are one of Milan’s fiercest rivals and they are also on a bit of a charge having won 6 of their last 8 games, reducing the gap on the top four.

“After Monday’s defeat we started looking forward again. Of course we analysed the mistakes made to improve further, but in football after a negative result, you can’t fossilise yourself on that: you need to turn the page and start again immediately.

“Now, therefore, maximum concentration on Juventus: it will be a great match and we need a better performance than the one against Spezia. We know that. We need an exceptional performance to beat them.”


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Tags AC Milan Milan-Juventus Olivier Giroud
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