Week 10: Milan – SPAL

Milan failed to win at Roma, Pioli chose to use Suso for 90 minutes again. The feeling of deja vu resurfaces coach after coach. The fault for the loss at Roma starts with the coach, the new coach doing his own survival little favours. The referee failed to punish Edin Dzeko with even a simple foul when he pushed Musacchio on the neck and not long after the Bosnian opened the scoring for Roma when left fully unmarked on the right of Donnarumma’s goal. Milan equalized through Hernandez but Calabria gifted the hosts the winning goal later in the match.

The aforementioned right back is and was supposedly the better right back after Conti’s poor form baffled many in the previous week and weeks but the right back situation is suddenly so bad that Leo Duarte, the supposed back up central defender is now likely getting a start on the right of the defense. The main problem remains further up the pitch as Suso was again a flop, very ineffective and very much stuck on the right wing providing very little. Not that it is likely to cost him a start. He is set to get another start in what is basically a 4-3-3 but not always, in the Roma game Milan did play something resembling a 4-2-3-1 but the formation didn’t matter too much. Individual quality is not up to par and as many as 9 out of the 11 players on the pitch need to be doing better. At least Pioli gave time to both Leao and Piatek up front. The Polish striker came on for the last 23 minutes in place of Paqueta, instead of replacing the Portuguese forward. Very little changed though.

SPAL feature two Milan alumni up front in Alberto Paloschi and Andrea Petagna. After this week 10 match Milan have games versus Lazio, Juventus and Napoli, but the impression out of Milan is that the focus has already shifted to the January transfer window with the apparent aim of finding experienced players that can stabilize this young team. Desperate times…

Follow the match as it happens, on the forum.