AC Milan will play the final game of a dreadful 2024-25 season against Monza on Saturday night, and it was the product of numerous mistakes.
La Gazzetta dello Sport have picked out seven moments around which the disastrous campaign revolved, and it starts with the decisions that were made before a ball was even kicked, more specifically in the planning for the season.
Read SempreMilan ad-free and get access to exclusive news. Click here for a free trial!
1. No Conte
Antonio Conte was more than willing to accept Milan a year ago. Among the teams he could join, it was his favoured choice, and rumours at the time said that Moncada had made a phone call to Conte. From then on, nothing.
Zlatan Ibrahimovic explained the decision in June 2024: “In Milan there is a coach, not a manager. We did not discuss Conte because, with all due respect, based on our criteria he is not what we were looking for.”
Milan wanted a coach with whom they could share decisions, who would not complain publicly as Conte so often has. In the end, simply winning might have been better, while Paulo Fonseca certainly raised his voice a few times.
2. On-field incidents
Fonseca made it very clear – more clearly than other coaches – that Milan’s problem was their attitude. Two key scenes: the cooling break against Lazio, and the penalties taken away from Pulisic vs. Fiorentina by Theo Hernandez and Abraham.
Winning dressing rooms have rules, examples, and a fight for a common goal. Milan, on the other hand, sent the opposite message and the coaches were only partially able to change course. Fonseca identified Theo as the main negative example and clashed with him.
Conceiçao even came close to brawling with Calabria. Did things go better in the spring? Maybe, but – as a key example – the poor performance in the sad Coppa Italia final was not that of a great team, not a winning group.
3. Absence of leadership
Who is the leader of Milan? A question that has been asked for months, if not years. The answer is usually Mike Maignan, who is also a particular leader, but that is not enough.
The great teams have groups that have grown together, with experienced players who indicate a line by example and call out those who make mistakes. And a core, if not necessarily Italian, with Serie A experience.
Milan have always signed promising players, as per the first rule of player trading, but for the entire season they have found themselves without a leader. The question is legitimate: wouldn’t it have made sense to focus on a couple of 30-year-olds in the summer?
4. A coach abandoned
Milan chose Julen Lopetegui a year ago but reneged on the decision under pressure from the fans. At that point, they went for Fonseca but protected him for a very short time. Fonseca was already coaching the derby on September 23rd knowing that, in case of defeat, he would be fired.
He never worked calmly. Gabbia scored the goal to beat Inter and gave him oxygen. Fonseca made it to Christmas but was fired shortly after, before New Year’s Eve. Looking back at things now, it was an almost inevitable fate.
5. Lack of balance
Fonseca and Conceiçao are opposite men and coaches. When things went badly with Fonseca, Milan decided to make a decisive change: a sharp turn. The two Portuguese, however, have one thing in common: they have never found balance.
Fonseca showed a good attacking phase but conceded too many goals, for reasons that are too trivial: carelessness, poorly managed transitions, missed preventive coverage.
Conceiçao, on the contrary, sorted out the defensive phase – four goals conceded in the last six games – but his Milan attacked badly, without ideas, relying on the individual efforts of its starts. In short, neither found balance.
6. Failed winter revolution
In January, Milan surprised with an ambitious transfer window, judged positively by almost everyone. Four months later, it looks to have been a desperate scramble to shuffle that cards and hope something clicked.
Gimenez is a reserve, Joao Felix a failed project, Walker has had little impact, Sottil less so. We will talk about Bondo again in at least a year. Milan, on the crucial day of the Coppa Italia final, sent them all to the bench.
7. Unclear management
Who is the face of Milan? It is not clear. Operationally, it is Giorgio Furlani: he has been making decisions for two years. Publicly, however, there is no voice that communicates the thoughts of the club, that intervenes to defend Milan or explain a decision.
Furlani spoke on TV after the Coppa Italia final: right, but it was an exception, not the norm. Ibrahimovic, after being the voice of Milan in the press conferences to present the players, has disappeared.
Scaroni speaks every now and then, sometimes generating controversy. Moncada is seen on TV from time to time and never in print. Overall, it is difficult to understand what Milan wants.
This is what happens when the people running the club are completely incompetent. This is precisely why you bring Conte in – to take all those decision away from you and have someone more competent making them. If he can turn an awful Napoli into Scudetto contenders, imagine what he would get out of the players we had…
“we don’t want managers”… clearly you do since everything you’ve attempted to “manage” turned to a brown stinky pile…
yeah he’s so good literally no other club wanted him and he had to settle for Napoli
And now they’re champions so every Italian club that had the chance to get him but didn’t can now admit they were wrong, app Ibra wanted Conte but was overruled by furlani and Moncada
Well said @ACM1899…..
BUT we have an ownership group that isn’t interested in winning tiles, only making profit. Winning costs $$$ and bringing in an experienced winning coach like Conte (who demands transfers to get his players) also costs $$$ – and that is something Redbird simply will not do. Cuts into their profit margin. Qualifying for UCL is the only goal. Just do enough to qualify without breaking the bank. So we have no future no matter who is the coach. Yes Conte would have delivered us a top 3 finish at the very least (if not a title) but that would have required sacrifice from a non-existent Owner and a grossly incompetent management team lead by a banker. Was never going to happen.
Sad
Winning doesn’t cost $$$.
Look at Atalanta.
Fans demanding endless supply of cash are a big part of the problem.
I’d never ask owners to spend more than they are comfortable with. All I ask is they spend whatever they want to spend in a way that actually improves the team. And they treat the players we’ve got with respect.
This management failed on all counts. They sold the club’s soul to Newcastle, fired its legend, and froze out its Scudetto winners, and replaced them with players and management that dragged the club down to 9th.
But they did that with the support of many on here. Endlessly demanding transfers, new shiny toys, disrespecting the players and manager who had actually delivered.
Keep praying for the Saudi’s to come to the rescue. Who cares if they murder journalists and execute minorities, it’s all about MONEY, right?
Winning TITLES you donkey. Wake up. Winning TITLES costs $$$$. WTF has Atlanta done – win one trophy in the past 75 years??? Is that the model you want from Milan?? That is Gerry’s model and sound like urs as well. Terrible.
And stop with the lecture on Morality. You’re a donkey if you think billionaires like Elliott are morally just and others are not lol. Grow up kid. You don’t become a billionaire by playing by the rules and being morally just. Life unfortunately doesn’t work like that
Conte’s PR is insane
He basically fell out at Napoli already and people still glaze him like he’s a genius
He is winning the Scudetto this weekend. You nuts? “Oh yeah he is, but but but”. Not but’s my friend. Ask any coach if they want to fall out with the club after one year but win the league. The answer will always be a yes.
Say what you wanna say, assume what you wanna assume. But the fact is that he takes this crippled Napoli that’s finished 10th last season into a Scudetto winning team. If it’s not an instant impact, I don’t know what is.
That, with only 20 mil spending difference with Milan in the market. And around 15 mil lower on salary budget compared to Milan.
Yeah and what will he do next season? Ever thought of that? or are you only here for short term managers and get a new Conte every season?
Why would anyone even want a guy who fights with literally every club he goes to?
Still better than trying to get new Pioli every season. In this kind of situation, I take a one season wonder coach that’s capable on bringing title and creating winning mentality rather than another potential (and yes-man) coach any day.
Ahhh there he is!!! The A$$🤡 @Boulden!!! Where u been hiding son? Shacking up with Uberhulk and the other Redbird Lovers?? LOL. Are we still “cooking” you donkey? Go back to bed and say hi to mom for me 🤣🤣. Good night now 😜
We glaze him cause he wins and has a track record of it in Serie A not cause we think he a genius, and that’s all we wanted someone worthy of Milan it didn’t have to be Pep. Most with sense already knew Napoli had a good chance of winning the league when he signed. Milan are finishing 8th or 9th this season let that sink in, you speak as if winning a scudetto and UCL place is worse than finishing in 9th, we fell out with two coaches already that delivered nothing (supercoppa means nothing don’t kid yourselves). I’d rather be Napoli fan with conte leaving than a 9th place Milan fan right now easy choice
Best point of this talk. There seems to be no vision.
Is Boulden Furlani’s handler in this website?
are you Conte’s PR team? You suck
Great points here. I want to add a few comments.
-Most of these points apply to last season as well. The writing was on the wall as soon as Maldini and Massara were fired and Tonali was sold. What followed was an unclear structure of management (point 7) who were incompetent and led a poor transfer campaign (point 6), which led to a poorly constructed and unbalanced team (point 5). We finished second in Serie A but equally far off first as we are now and exited the Champions League in the first round as well.
-The Lopetegui situation further showed this management’s weakness. They abandoned their choice due to pressure from the fans, suggesting there was no sporting basis for Lopetegui’s hire. Remember Pioli’s appointment, #Pioliout, and the Ragnick takeover plot. Did Maldini, Massara, and Boban abandon Pioli? No, because they had proper footballing discussions to vet Pioli and confidence in a plan they all put together.
-This season is just round two of last season and it has led to a snowball effect.
If Pioli didn’t leave we would way better off, Pioli was respected by the players. His milan had a identity, and attack was second to inter. Fonseca said he wanted to play like Spain, and milan was confused ever sense. We would have never been in this position under Pioli, he brought us from where we are now.
Napoli was given by bookmakers a 0.4% chance of winning the league. Today they won it. Who is the man who actually won it with a relatively modest roster? Antonio Conte. The guy we didn’t want. We saved 3 million by not hiring Conte (the difference between his 6.5 million salary at Napoli and the 2.5 million we paid to Fonseca and 1 million we paid to Conceiçao). So we saved 3 million and lost 100 million by not qualifying to Europe. Congrats, Milan’s management!
The one silver lining this season: we effectively prevented Inter from winning the league. They lost the league to Napoli by 1 point, and we made them drop 5 league points.
Bookmakers are idiots napoli always had a good enough chance to compete this season. Milan and Juve were getting new coaches so we had no real clue just expectations on how this season would go and I wouldn’t exactly say their teams are much better than Napoli’s, let’s be real no one thought Bologna Roma lazio or Atalanta were ever going to win the league so realistically it was down to Inter Napoli Milan Juve with inter being obvious favs
The club won’t go anywhere with the fans it has.
I stopped following Milan once they forced out Calabria. I canceled my subscription and haven’t watched a game since. The first time in 40 years.
Most people didn’t seem to care and continued watching, moaning and speculating.
The club is the players, the players are the club. You can’t separate the two. It’s the players you watch. The players are the team.
Milan are not a team because the players come and go.
The two longest serving players left in January, and the fans were largely indifferent and some even put the boot in.
What is the point?
What’s the point of claiming to support a team and then holding its players in contempt?
All based on some misguided notion that there’s something better out there, an ‘upgrade’, with a higher ‘ceiling’.
A team with constant ‘upgrades’ ceases to be a team. Because it ceases to have the players that make the team.
People have a go at me for switching to Como. The truth is I never really switched. But I’ll always have soft spot for the club because of my childhood and also Cutrone.
Milan could’ve had a core of Donnarumma, Calabria, Gabbia, Locatelli and Cutrone. That would have provided the foundations of a team. But greed and incompetence destroyed the foundations of the team. What’s left is a collection of individuals.
It’s unclear how any foundation can be built from this. It takes years to build. Milan are probably 5-10 away even if they were somehow able to make vaguely intelligent decisions.
But the fans deserve this. Their lack of loyalty has brought them the failure they deserve.
Whether or not I come back is an open question. We’ll see what happens with the new manager and whether I can’t start to feel a connection with the players again. Because the players are really all that matters. That is why we (or at least I) watch football.
I don’t know why you are still here complaining and crying and whinning. You said you left right?? Then make like your words and actually LEAVE. oh wait you can’t. It’s that hypocritical nature of yours. We are not crying to you. So please go to como and stay there.
By jove man you are always here b*ching and moaning about Milan. Cutrone was never going to be here for long or any of your glue sniffing legends either. Please do us all a favor, stop been a hypocrite and LEAVE PERMANENTLY. GOD DAMN
Donnaruma wanted wages Milan couldn’t afford and he chose to leave on a free, locatelli admitted he a Juve fan, Gabbia was bad, became better but honestly still hasn’t shown enough consistency, Calabria and I liked cutrone a lot but both just weren’t good enough, Milan should have never got royal he sucked at a lesser team I don’t know what management was thinking.
You have some nerve coming here and lecturing other people about being real fans and lack of loyalty as ifoveelord fan supreme. GTFOH!. You’re the worst “fan” I’ve been seen on the site. You actively cheered on for the club’s downfall, laughed at when we lost games and declared that you’re now going to follow Como due to proximity. You claim we don’t represent Italy akin to Parma ham being made elsewhere and yet you declared your support for Como, a team with a foreign coach, foreign owner and foreign players..and yes I will bring it up everytime you post. Now you’re back tracking ..oh I was only joking about supporting Como. STFU! You can’t scream fans not loyal, yet you actively cheered against the thing you claim to love and declare your support for another club. The biggest hypocrite b!tch on this site! FOH
Not sure where you get this from:
“Conceiçao, on the contrary, sorted out the defensive phase – four goals conceded in the last six games – but his Milan attacked badly, without ideas, relying on the individual efforts of its starts. In short, neither found balance.”
Conceicao’s defence was mostly awful.
Apart from a brief interlude at the end (under 343) when it was too little too late.
In 30 matches Conceicao’s teams have given up 36 goals. With a GD of just +12.
Before the 343 run the numbers were abysmal.
Fonseca gave up 28 goals in 24 games.
A rate that is slightly better and a GD of +15 in 6 fewer games.
We went backwards after the dismissal. No doubt in my mind.
In my opinion, tbe worst sin was how he treated Maldini. That was a huge signal that this man ( Cardinale ) doesn’t know if the ball is round or square!!