AC Milan got their first win of the 2024-25 season on Saturday night at San Siro, routing newly-promoted Venezia 4-0 with four different players scoring.
All four goals came in the first half, effectively ending the contest before the interval. The first was scored after 90 seconds as Theo Hernandez snuck one in from a narrow angle, then a close-range ricochet went in that was eventually awarded to Youssouf Fofana.
Things went from bad to worse for the away side when Tammy Abraham and Rafael Leao each drew spot kicks in quick succession. The first was tucked away by Christian Pulisic, and Abraham took care of the second.
It is exactly what the Rossoneri needed with all of the pressure surrounding the team and the manager, especially in view of the two daunting upcoming games against Liverpool in the Champions League and Inter in the league. Our writer Rohit Rajeev has a tactical analysis from the game.
The double pivots
Paulo Fonseca’s 4-2-3-1 featured the double pivot where two players would stay in a pre-decided distance of each other in phases of the game. In the build-up in previous games Milan played in a 3+2 system with the double pivot aiding the building from the back.
Against Venezia, with Ruben Loftus-Cheek as part of the double pivot, Milan played with a 3+1 in build-up with the Englishman pushing up to play alongside Tijjani Reijnders as a mezzala. The fact that Eusebio Di Francesco decided to press with only one man up front didn’t help Venezia’s cause.
When Milan lost the ball, Milan reverted back to the double pivot and played the usual 4-2-4 in an iteration reminiscent of Fonseca’s style at Roma.
Building out from the back is something that has been demonstrated already in the clip below. You can see how Mike Maignan has been used an extra man in the build-up phase, with the goalkeeper trying to bait opposition into pressing him and then find gaps in their press.
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Pressing
Milan pressed with two lines of four, with the double pivot in place to snuff out any danger between the lines.
They would purposely leave the player on the far side of the pitch as a part of a trap. As soon as the pass was made the players would push to that side and press him aggressively to win the ball back.
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Milan’s counter-pressing was also on point. In this situation you can see how two or three players press the player aggressively, win the ball back and move it forward immediately.
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The 4-4-2 experiment and positional changes
With Milan having a four-goal lead, Fonseca decided to try something out: playing Abraham alongside the substitute Alvaro Morata up front, to see if the two clicked and complemented each other.
However, just before Venezia scored their disallowed goal, Di Francesco shifted to a 3-5-2 outnumbering the Rossoneri’s two-man pivot with a three-man midfield which led to the goal. It immediately made Fonseca sub out Abraham for Yunus Musah to restore parity.
It is good to see how Milan are slowly transitioning into a team that uses positional play with rotations. With Pulisic tucking in, Abraham dropped into the left forward role (Leao’s position) while Leao pushed up as the striker.
This forces the Venezia defenders to follow Tammy and Leao, fully freeing up the left side giving Theo an unopposed run.
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Areas to improve
Fabio Capello spoke about Milan’s need to improve in defending due to gaps appearing, and it is easy to see what he is getting at.
The clip below was taken just before the third goal. You can see how Venezia back line baits Milan’s front four to press them and then they launch a long ball. The gap between the front four and the back four is so huge that there is too much space between the lines.
Venezia, unlike better teams, don’t have that quality so they fumbled and they were punished. Simone Inzaghi will have taken note of it though, and Inter could therefore bait Milan’s front line into pressing. This was one of the main issues during Stefano Pioli’s last season.
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One solution could be for the backline to push up to be vertically compact, or the forwards to sit back and not take the bait and force the opposition to play through the thirds.
However, even that is also a problem. In the first instance you can see how Pulisic does not take Busio in his cover shadow and the Venezia defender has a straight pass to Busio which leads to a chance.
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In the second instance Leao fails to cover Duncan and it gives Venezia easy ways to break the pressing. In both cases the challenge of keeping short distances between all players – including strikers – was failed.
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Another thing worth noting is how Milan defend crosses. It may be tactical instruction or whether it is the instinct of Strahinja Pavlovic, but him leaving his man and aggressively trying to head the ball away increases risk exponentially.
With no time for Theo to react, if Pavlovic misses his header like in the future a better finisher would have the open goal at his mercy.
— Rohit Rajeev (follow @keralista) (@keralista_v2) September 16, 2024
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Set piece analyses
Below are some annotated clips of a corner kick and a defensive throw-in which further allow us to understand Fonseca’s instructions regarding the set-up from dead ball situations.
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Stats
Milan’s PPDA (Passes Per Defensive Action, an indicator of how effective a press is) was an impressive eight while they had high turnovers.
Meanwhile the athletic data seems to suggest that the team eased off a bit after the lead and ran less, keeping the schedule in mind.
“However, just before Venezia scored their disallowed goal, Di Francesco shifted to a 3-5-2 outnumbering the Rossoneri’s two-man pivot with a three-man midfield which led to the goal.”
We’re always bound to suffer against low block counter attacking 352 playing two pivot and high pressing football.