AC Milan have had two head coaches this season in Paulo Fonseca and Sergio Conceicao, and the fact is both have failed to find the magic formula.
La Gazzetta dello Sport compares Conceiçao’s Milan side to a leopard, in the sense that they changed everything without actually changing anything. His team is very different from Fonseca’s and in fact, those two are nothing alike.
Milan under Fonseca wanted the ball, the same players under another Portuguese coach leave it to their opponents, as seen by Como’s domination of possession on Saturday. A question arises, do Milan have a problem with the way they play?
The attacking data
The Expected Goals data makes for interesting reading, the stat aims to measure the goal opportunities created in a match in terms of their quality and danger.
Conceiçao’s Milan creates 1.67xG per match, against Fonseca’s 1.64xG. Is it because of the counter-attack? No: 0.25xG on the counter for Conceicao against 0.24xG under Fonseca.
The data for xG from set pieces (0.43 against 0.42 in the Fonseca era) and from open play (1.24 against 1.22) are also practically identical.
Not only that, three of the four matches in which Milan produced more xG are in the Conceiçao era: the Supercoppa Italiana derby, Milan-Cagliari soon after and the comeback win over Lecce.
It means that Milan are a prisoner of their own limitations and cannot find a way to be what it could be: one of the best teams in the league, especially from an attacking standpoint.
On paper, they have everything in Tijjani Reijnders, Rafael Leao, Christian Pulisic and Santiago Gimenez to create and score, even Samuel Chukwueze, Joao Felix and Tammy Abraham from the bench.
Yet, every game is a lottery: you don’t know what will happen. Reijnders and Pulisic are consistent, for the others it’s better to accept that they will be up and down.
The differences
The team are different compared to the months under Fonseca, and it mostly boils down to how he and his compatriot have contrasting ways of viewing posssession.
A zoom on the data makes it clear. Under the former, Milan held the ball for an average of 14 seconds and made 4.6 passes before giving the ball to the opponents. The current coach cut that data to 11 seconds and 3.8 passes, confirming that he is not interested in possession.
What matters more is doing well in the defensive phase, not getting caught in transition and staying balanced. The old Milan shot almost 4 times per game from build-up (not a counter-attack or set piece), but this has declined to 2.5 under Conceicao.
On the other hand, counter-attack shots have increased by 33%. The trends are clear: Fonseca’s Milan played better, Conceiçao’s has more character, as the six comebacks testify. Everyone chooses according to taste.
The players
The players see the team’s DNA change and adapt. Reijnders dribbles less, Theo Hernandez stays deeper and seems to have no energy to counter and Youssouf Fofana often ends up on the bench.
Felix would probably be better suited to Fonseca’s football, but he hasn’t shared a dressing room with him for a single day. Leao under Conceiçao would have everything to be fundamental but accelerates less than the Milan fans would like, perhaps less than he could.
Milan thus remain a half-team, that creates and destroys everything (and then maybe recreates from scratch, in a comeback). The team changed face when the calendar flipped to 2025, yet the same consistencies remain.
‘The old Milan shot almost 4 times per game from build-up’ – yes, and probably one out of these 4 came from Fofana to avoid losing the ball for a counter. We all know where these shots went.
I will never understand why they felt the need to get rid of Pioli only to replace him with Lopetegui, Fonseca or Conceição? None of them are an upgrade to Pioli.
This Milan management and owner has to be the dumbest in football history.
Pioli’s time had come to a natural end. He was losing the dressing room. He said so after the ROMA game in EL. He couldn’t get them to respond anymore.
This is very true, every coach, every team has its window. Pioli’s slammed shut when he lost every important game last season.
Basically the whole fanbase, media etc wanted Pioli out as well
fans had expectations too high and asked for a change. media also played their part. of course fans blame it on the management now.
i was against the change back then, but i have to admit, that compared to Sergio (who will bring us a lot of joy if we let him work) Pioli seemed already a bit empty.
Manager/coach is THE most important member of the team!
A team managed well can over achieve and the reverse is also true, as we see this season.
A smart ownership will pay whatever is necessary to attract the best coach they can.
For example, if Klopp decided to coach again (he’d almost certainly got to Madrid) and he earned £15m per year at Liverpool. Would our owners pay him? NO
And yet he could almost single handedly increase the value of the club.
De Zerbi was my 1st choice in summer. At this point I can’t see any good manager taking this sh1ty job.
Perhaps get Capello out of retirement!
Fonseca was the victim of bad player attitude and no support from the fans. He was trying to reinvent this squad but some of the players seemed liked they were never going to buy in. I also remember learning his first season at Lille they had a slow start to the campaign but took off after the first 15ish games. I think the really that the culture of the players in the club needed to change really was a shock for some (cough cough Calabria). Maybe if given the time Fonseca could have gotten Milan humming but who knows. I think tactically Fonseca was sound but player management was not. I also thought he talked too candidly about the refs and the players at times even though both absolutely deserved the criticism.
Conceicao continued the culture change which continued the player attitude problems but is also the victim of starting mid season and having little time to teach his tactics. I don’t think we can really judge Conceicao because he took over midseason at a time of absolute crisis. Regardless this whole episode reaffirms that midseason coaching changes don’t really do much.
Honestly this club needs SD to find the one or two players that can make things click but above all a good psychiatrist and some peace to work without distractions, without the paparazzi ripping them for everything they do or don’t do.
exactly this: ‘some peace to work without distractions’
i think they are used to paparazzi and media nonsense, but their own fanbase booing even after wins hits a player.
management has to find peace with the support, cause i think part of it is already so angry about prices etc. that they even prefer to be unsuccessful to make Redbird sell.
funny enough Sergio is considering these fan dynamics more than most of the coaches would do, but fans already want him out.
If you want peace then don’t take a job at a big club.
Simple as that.
Malgré les mauvais résultats je pense toujours que Conceicao est l’homme de la situation. Qu’on le laisse construire l’équipe comme il le voudrait et on verra la suite. Prenons l’exemple de Leverkusen. Lorsque Alonso est arrivé en cours de saison ils n’ont pas été aussi magnifiques. Il a construit l’équipe avec les joueurs qu’il voulait l’année suivante et on a tous vu le résultat. Donnons lui simplement du temps Si on doit changer il nous faudrait quelqu’un qui apporte un vent nouveau avec des nouvelles idées et un management différent comme Fabregas
Interesting article to see some of the comparison statistics between their times.
However, from my perspective you left out the most important stats on Goals For & Goals Against.
On this count Fonseca was miles in front.
Fonseca – 24 games
W=12, D=6, L=6
GF=43, GA=28 > GD=+15
Conceicao – 19 games
W=10, D=3, L=6
GF=29, GA=24 > GD=+5
Conceicao’s strategy seems to want to work from a solid defence and then counter attacking. Problem is we don’t have a solid defence and he is conceding well over 1 goal per game. It feels like we concede 2 goals per game but it is actually 1.3 p/game.
Fonseca’s team had a bad start but was improving. Particularly on defence. They controlled the game much more and were capable of actually dominating and converting a lot more goals. Hence a significantly better GD.
In my opinion we have significantly regressed with the decision to replace Fonseca with Conciecao.