Pioli addresses Milan’s home struggles and admits preparing for Sampdoria game was ‘difficult’

AC Milan head coach Stefano Pioli has admitted that preparing for the Sampdoria game was made difficult by international call-ups.

Milan left it late to snatch a draw against Sampdoria on Saturday lunchtime as their San Siro struggles continued. A mistake at the back allowed Fabio Quagliarella to give the away side a second half lead with a lob over Gianluigi Donnarumma.

Adrien Silva saw red for Samp due to a second yellow card not long after, and substitute Jens Petter Hauge popped up to snatch a late draw for Milan, though Franck Kessie did hit the woodwork late on.

The result means that Milan failed to close the gap on Inter to three points as they would have hoped, and opens to door slightly for the teams below them in the top four race.

Pioli spoke at a press conference after the game against Sampdoria, and it lasted just five minutes with his comments transcribed by MilanNews.

What went wrong?

“Milan have complicated their life by themselves because we have not approached the match well, when mentally you can’t get into the game right away then the difficulties of the match increase.”

Is it a mental or physical problem due to the international call-ups?

“The game approach was difficult for us, then on a technical level and game choices we were less precise.”

Why doesn’t the team have the right attitude at home?

“Today it was like this, it’s not a general thing because for example with Manchester United at home we had the right attitude, but today we didn’t succeed and we paid dearly because we didn’t win.”

How do you explain the lack of clarity in the final third? “We were not very clear in the choices and not technically precise to hurt the opponent, Sampdoria lined up very well.”