AC Milan were a team that prided themselves on their defensive record for most of the campaign, yet that too has now crumbled.
Milan’s attacking crisis is well known and has been going on for months. The defence – as La Gazzetta dello Sport report – was the only real certainty for Milan in the 2025-26 season, but now it too has deserted them.
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Throughout the season, the Rossoneri have repeatedly experienced various problems, but if there was one thing Milan could proudly pin to their chest, it was their rearguard. It collapsed just when it needed to tighten even further, especially in a team with 18 goals scored in their last 17 games.
Solidity vanished
Milan have now conceded five goals in the last two games. It becomes nine if we look at the last six, a spell in which the three goals let in against Udinese stand out. Then, Mike Maignan didn’t pick the ball out of his net after the games against Verona and Juventus, but it would be short-lived tranquility.
Before the last two matches, Milan still boasted the second-best defence in Europe’s major leagues in terms of average goals conceded per game. Allegri’s hope was ultimately understandable: to guard their own net thoroughly, trusting that the attackers would unlock themselves.
It has not come to fruition. The goals conceded against Sassuolo and Atalanta allow us to realise that opponents these days find the net against Milan in far too easy ways. Individual and departmental lapses have crept in, early in games too.
In the first half of the season, Milan’s defensive unit seemed to have no problem spending large spells of games under pressure, often defending a one-goal lead right until the end. Has this now caught up with them?
In certain moments, the current unit are experiencing situations that were thought to have been confined and archived to last season, under Paulo Fonseca and Sergio Conceiçao. Now, one exchange, one sprint, one loose pass is enough to leave Milan ‘exposed and vulnerable’.
