AC Milan face a big test this evening against Slovan Bratislava in the Champions League, and Paulo Fonseca has named a heavily rotated XI from the weekend’s draw against Juventus.
After the draw at the weekend, Milan must return to winning ways. The race for the Scudetto now seems a step too far away, at least for now, and the Champions League spots are becoming distanced. Therefore, a positive run in the competition is needed, to keep fans on the side mainly.
Aside from fan relations, the club could also pocket a pretty penny from advancing further in the competition, so Fonseca must do everything in his power to try and reach the top eight qualifying spots.
From the weekend, Emerson Royal, Matteo Gabbia, Malick Thiaw, Yunus Musah, Ruben Loftus-Cheek, Rafael Leao and Alvaro Morata all miss out. The Brazilian suffered a knock, as did Leao, but it seems this isn’t the reason for his absence, and of course, Morata is suspended.
In their places, Davide Calabria returns to right-back, and Fikayo Tomori will partner Strahinja Pavlovic to make up the back four. The front four is fully changed, Samuel Chukwueze and Noah Okafor will operate on the wings, whilst Christian Pulisic will roam behind Tammy Abraham.
Official Milan XI (4-2-3-1): Maignan; Calabria, Tomori, Pavlovic, Theo Hernandez; Fofana, Reijnders; Chukwueze, Pulisic, Okafor; Abraham.
Bench: Sportiello, Torriani, Loftus-Cheek, Rafa Leao, Emerson Royal, Thiaw, Terracciano, Gabbia, Camarda, Musah.
Official Slovan Bratislava XI (3-4-3): Takac; Kashia, Bajric, Voet; Blackman, Kucka, Savvidis, Medvedev; Barseghyan, Strelec, Metsoko
Bench: Trnovsky, Hrdina, Tolic, Marcelli, Mustafic, Mak, Zuberu, Pauschek, Gajdos, Vojtko, Szoke, Ihnatenko.
❗️ OFFICIAL: #ACMilan's starting XI for #SlovanMilan
🤔 Thoughts? pic.twitter.com/Y5s5undZVL
— SempreMilan (@SempreMilanCom) November 26, 2024
Let’s see how this experiment plays out. Because why keep a steady back 4 for a change? Musical chairs.
Fonseca really taking us for a ride here. He does questionable things where I can’t stomach it no more and when you think he’s going to get sacked, we play a high level team and him and the team outplay them and win and all of a sudden I have hope we’re finally on the right path. Starting to be a pattern that I do not like, I want the consistency!
Gabbia and Thiaw did very well against Juve (although Juve had a handicapped offense) but then Fonseca changes the CB duo again. These players will never get used to each other.
Slovan is a really weak team so maybe we’ll win whatever the lineup is (although we do tend to play down to the competition) but here we go, benching Rafa again, starting Okafor which rarely works well, SMH.
If we don’t win this game due to the heavy 7-player rotation, Fonseca will go down another notch in my (lack of) respect.
Just when you thought the defence couldn’t get any more precarious……
Fonseca criticized for lack of rotation before.
Now he’s criticized for too many rotation.
Although by now he should have had a starting cb pair, not just mix and match every single game.
That being said i hate how inconsistent this team has been.
One game we destroy Madrid, the next game we struggle against Cagliari
I don’t mind this XI but we will see how it pans out and I wont even come with a prediction because if our players underestimates Slovan Bratislava this could turn out as a long and ugly evening, I’ll hope for the best though.
Enough testing defensive partnerships! Play Gabbia & Thiaw with Theo & Calabria as fullbacks. Stop playing reinjders as a DM and sell Royal!!!!
Christian does the biz as usaual.
Abraham gets the ball clean through on goal and f-cks it up.
1-1 and they could be winning.
fyi this is the worst team in the CL
Defence sucks at first team, at Futuro and Primavera too. We can see a patern here…
Why is the defence so high up the pitch??? For God’s sake???
We shouldn’t even be struggling in this match.
Slow slow slow – what a predictable side we are – they all need shooting and passing practice too
Can someone get these fellas some cocaine at half time?
LOL
They don’t deserve any free coke. They do nevertheless deserve electric dog collars and getting a zap if/when they are slacking off.
😂
I’m tired of watching. It’s like we have no. Idea what to do with the ball. No team work, no creativity.
We are so bad (again…)
Nonseca is repeating Pioli’s mistakes step-by-step.
Pioli also used to start playing with weak lineup against weak teams and concede the goals and at the end, he was starting main players from the bench when game is gone/dead. Those players playing with 2x power to save the game and were tired asf…
Nonseca is doing exactly the same thing lol
This team is an embarrassment to the club of A.C Milan.
We are playing THE WORST team in the competition!! A team that has been beaten by 5 or 6 goals by lesser clubs than Milan!
Abraham and Pavlovic are absolute donkeys!
looking at the 3 stooges (Ibra, Moncada, Furlani) just infuriates me
What are they doing? You know the only thing bratislava can do is counter attack and you leave nobody back there? After that milan are walking and have 0 ideas. This is a game you need to go and score 5. Absolutely embarrassing, I’m so sick of this crap we can’t defend and we can’t break down a team.
If that’s what it takes to see Fonzy leave then so be it.
What about Moncada who chose him? or Zlatan the big dumb mouth piece who would whore himself for a Euro?
So rafa was fit after all… sigh fonseca, you old cow…
Does move like he’s fit
Doesn’t *
This team is a huge disgrace and a mess ppl
It seems this team is playing to get the coach sacked. I don’t understand this kind of playing.
Finally both teams playing as expected.
Damn, not over yet what a goal by Slovan’s Marcinelli.
😀 now a red card for the Slovaks.
We have 11 players on the field playing a athletic sport and there is only 1 player moving at the time, rest just walks. Depressed team
Fofana looks like the only one that’s not walking around the pitch all the damn time and guess why? he never played under Pioli. all other players that played under Pioli (Abraham didn’t) can’t just stop themselves from walking up and down the field. This is ridiculous and shows a deeper problem than we can blame Fonseca for. The truth is, Milan should easily win SLB with Leao and even Pulisic on the bench. Our second team (if we’re serious about winning anything) should be able to easily beat this team. These players are so stuck in Pioli’s tactics and mindset that it’s hard to see Fonseca break them from this psychological issue they seem to be having. However, we have our best start in the Champs league in 17 years so we will take that and move on.