In recent weeks, AC Milan has looked to their Primavera side for solutions to their problems. As such, it has seen both Jan-Carlo Simic and Francesco Camarda make their debuts. However, in the future, there may be a route for them to enter senior football without the challenges of the first team.
MilanNews writes that the Rossoneri may follow suit with Juventus, by creating an under-23 side to enter into Serie C if a place opens for them. While Stefano Pioli has often found the right moments to entrust his youngsters with first-team football, offering them a chance in Serie C could further their progress whilst removing some responsibility attached to senior football.
Simic showed against Monza that he has the physicality and reliability to make it as a central defender in Serie A, and didn’t look out of place to say it was his debut. As a result, there have now been calls to stop the experiments with other positions and give the youngster a proper chance from the get-go.
However, should he not be deemed ready, or even when others return, there should be an alternative to the Primavera. In the form of a side registered to Serie C of players under 23.
One for those who join the club and are not yet ready for the senior setup, but are at a level above the Primavera. Maybe even for those who have outgrown the Primavera and again are not yet ready for the first team.
Either way, Juventus has proved that doing so is a viable model and one that the Rossoneri could look to take advantage of, should they be offered the chance to do so.
I want this to happen so badly.
This then creates a situation that the youngins can get experience against grown men in actual games.
Heck. Pioli might even call them up more often. It’s not like he can call them up less often right?
😂😂
Of course he can as he has given 3 primavera players their debut this season and also given minutes to a promoted primavera player in traore.
Its the natural solution also considering that teams has been limited to now loan out 7 players and 6 from next year if i recollect right. Otherwise we will ehave to sell youngsters and most likely some of them at a cheap. Serie c matches with a team that plays with the same ideas and formation(s) as the first team will be greatly beneficial-
Our primavera are one of best in the world we have a lot of talent youths that deserves minutes but because of this man pioli he can give them chance until he don’t have choice
In the time I’ve been an AC Milan fan which is over 30 years I simply cant remember any coach who has given so many young players their debut and let alone in such a short span of time he has been coach for the club but you guys keep up the false narrative like its actually remotely correct.
They are just trolls, can’t even be rational for a second here. Apart from Coubis who is no where to be found and Simic I don’t even think we have a player who is ready to start regular games for us. That too with caution you never know what those predat0rs can do to these inexperienced kids.
If these guys want to see more academy graduates playing for the senior team they should go and support Atalanta or some club like Ajax..
Well I’m pretty sure a lot of them are just trolls some are teens who think they themselves are ready to conquer the world but in the end are nothing but full of p1ss and vinegar but lacks the undertstanding of the bigger picture.
If i understand you correctly then I agree they will be the first as well to jump those talents if they doesnt live up to their expectation amd they will do it as hyenas.
That could definitely be a good solution for all of us but maybe they should just start watching some of the primavera matches because they are in fact not as good as they seem to think. I’ll suggest them to watch the recent primavera match against Newcastle Utd as it was pretty appalling to make one mistake after the other on a simple level and anyone in their right frame of mind wouldn’t directly promote the lot of them to start as some suggests.
Not a troll. Love intelligent debate.
How often has Pioli played Primavera players unless he’s absolutely had to put them on the bench?
That’s part of the problem. Good coaches want to blood their youth products on purpose. Look at Pep and his selection this pat week. It seems Pioli does it only when required.
I tried to reply a bit earlier but it wasnt posted so ill make it short but i was also speaking more generally speaking than specifically calling you one.
You can always discuss how much or when but he has nevertheless played 3 this year and also gave Bartesaghi his debiut when he could have for example fielded florenzi on the left side. Please name me an ac milan coach who has given more young player their debut than Pioli and im not only speaking about primavera players because i cant think of one. Same goes for inter or juve coaches who has promoted or fielded more young players than him.
Im not sure what match you are referring to but first of all city can basically pick and choose talents as they see fit and epl alsp has a second league where players also can play against seniors so that might help thir talents as well to prepare them for the first team.
Overall though i like seeing young players given a chance and always has but still most youth players are bound to fail.
They are just trolls, can’t even be rational for a second here. Apart from Coubis who is no where to be found and Simic I don’t even think we have a player who is ready to start regular games for us. That too with caution you never know what those predat0rs can do to these inexperienced kids.
If these guys want to see more academy graduates playing for the senior team they should go and support Atalanta or some club like Ajax.
I am critical of certain decisions of Pioli not to play Primavera players but it’s context specific. The general calls to just play the kids are naïve at best. Top 4, Scudetto chasing, UCL aspiring teams do not play U19 players unless out of necessity or because the individual player is a prodigy / can genuinely help the team win.
I see no reason that Chaka Traore could not get more minutes running down the left wing, particularly to give Leao a break. Okafor has been injured, a lot, and Leao already broke down because of an unmanageable workload. In addition, there is virtually no downside to Traore playing because Milan cannot really be exposed by having Traore in the team on a wing – it’s not like he is a CM or CB where the structure falls apart if he doesn’t do the right thing.
Playing Florenzi at right back and then living with his mistakes, being the ones Pioli is scared Bartesaghi might make on account of his lack of experience makes no sense to me. Bartesaghi might not be a 2-way full back but I suspect he is more than capable of playing as a defensively-minded full back. The team can live with that.
I think Zeroli, for example, could ultimately add a physical B2B dynamic that the team doesn’t have. But I stop well short of thinking he should play now (absent an injury crisis even Milan hasn’t yet seen). The midfield game is too complicated to just assume that the kid and the team wouldn’t be exposed for his presence.
And as much as I’d love for Camarda, as another example, to score before he turns 16, he is a mile off being a Serie A striker at this point in time. He was a boy playing a man’s game even though he is a big and powerful 15 year old.
There is a separate structural / philosophical issue as to what Milan intends to get out of its youth system. That we see Locatelli, Bellanova and Cristante, for example, playing for other side (including top sides) is extremely frustrating.
This issue also overlaps with financial limitations on purchasing players / inability to complete with the EPL clubs which is likely to last at least until Milan’s stadium is built (if that ever actually happens). A way to cheat the system is to develop world class players through the youth set up and to then integrate those players into the senior team.
It seems that is what having the U23 team is about. Adding the much needed stepping stone between the Primavera and the Serie A.
Players like Bakoune, Zeroli, Bartesaghi (were it not for him being depth in the senior ream) and even Simic are developed enough physically that they probably benefit more playing Serie C than Primavera in their 19th years.
But the gap from Serie C to Serie A is still massive. I have been tracking the way Juventus uses its U23 side. Soule, for example, played about a full season of U23 matches before going on loan to Frosinone this season.
Having thought about it, I’d be trying to strike up partnerships with Monza (Serie A), Lecco (Serie B), Como (Serie B) and even Brescia (Serie B) which are all basically suburbs of Milan (within about 50km) to take players on loan. I’d pay the players wages and even incentivise the player’s use by paying the team based how many minutes are played (the issue with loans is what Daniel Maldini is currently facing – nonsensically being left on the bench). I think the money having an U23 team could be better spent by creating a network of affiliated feeder teams but I do not know whether local politics makes using these smaller relatives feasible.
Honestly it’s as though some people see an article on this site, about how good a 16 year old youth product is, and as soon as they’ve finished skim-reading it they are demanding Pioli starts him.
Anyway – a thousands yeses to Milan U23 PLEEEEAAAAASE!