Week 31: Inter Milan - A.C. Milan (Sunday, April 19 - 20:45 CET)

[nefremo]

Just to add more of the same.......Inzaghi is so terrible. This guy is clueless. Makes moves just for the sake of making them. Bonaventura played 3 different positions in the span of 15 minutes. A FUKING comedy.

[devoted_dm]

I don't really think this is Pippo's fault though. He can't give the team instructions to defend with 10 men and hope for a lucky goal. That's just not the Milan style, so he'd surely get fired then. The problem is that our players aren't good enough to dominate other teams, but will still try, as that is what they've been told to do. So our midfielders will push forward while our defenders have to stay deep to avoid conceding on the inevitable counter-attacks. That leaves us stretched and exposed at the back, and when our defenders are constantly under pressure like that, we will concede sooner or later. The fact that we didn't tonight was down to luck and some really solid centre back performances.

Then there's the mental factor. Zapata said it in an interview a few weeks ago: The current situation regarding the club's leadership is affecting the team's performances. It's no wonder. If I worked for a company where everything was up in the air regarding who's in charge and who the owner is, and there's a complete lack of clarity about the future, my job performance would suffer too.

How do you build a confident team in conditions like that? So yeah, I think Pippo's done well, all things considered. I hope he stays on for another year, at least. Give him a proper chance to show what he can do, when things are a bit more stable and we have improved the squad a bit.

[reza]

Someone still defending Pippo?
In all seriousness though, such a situation as you describe requires a good motivator, if anybody feels he is doing ok with the players he has on the pitch then it must be surely clear that he has failed motivationally.

[nefremo]

i disagree. I think he did set up the team to defend in the first half. This is why he started with Menez up top. The defensive line was set at the same place for about 30 minutes - clearly a set plan. The line was about 25-30 meters from our goal. Our midfielders started pressure 10 meters into our own half. This was a set plan, and it was very clear. We were defending with 9 and hoping that we get a counter through Menez. Exactly what you said.
The last 15 minutes of that first half is when we moved the line up and the midfielders actually applied pressure in Inter's half. This was also the best part of our game. For those last 15 minutes in the first half we actually looked half way decent.
For me, this was a clear plan. Soak up pressure and try to counter for the first 30, then get out and play for 15.

The second half was a disaster. Low quality with tons of mistakes. Bunch of stupid substitutions that were made with no real purpose.

The fact of the matter is that the situation of the club was not what it is now for the entire season, yet we've been the same shit team the entire season. I know that it's not easy to perform with all that's going on but this goes beyond that. Pippo has failed in every single objective this year. There is no way he can be defended any longer, and contrary to you, I pray that he doesn't stay beyond this season. He is completely out of his depth. He needs to go somewhere where he can discover himself and his philosophy...as he's had this team for 9 months and he's failed to give them any kind of an identity mainly because I don't think he knows what he wants that identity to be.

This is not all his fault. Not blaming only him for this season. Everyone is to blame. Galliani, Berlusconi, the players, and Pippo. Which is why I'm calling for everyone's head. But I wouldn't trust Pippo even with better players and better management. He is our legend, but he has done nothing so far to prove that he deserves to coach a team like Milan. On the contrary, he has been quite terrible actually. IMO, he needs to go at the end of the season.

[devoted_dm]

i disagree. I think he did set up the team to defend in the first half. This is why he started with Menez up top. The defensive line was set at the same place for about 30 minutes - clearly a set plan. The line was about 25-30 meters from our goal. Our midfielders started pressure 10 meters into our own half. This was a set plan, and it was very clear. We were defending with 9 and hoping that we get a counter through Menez. Exactly what you said.

I don't know, I doubt that was the plan from the beginning. Inter played with a lot of intensity in the beginning, which is something we always struggle to deal with. We tend to drop deep when that happens. Once they took their foot off the gas a bit, we started playing much better, as Abate and Antonelli could worry a bit less about defending and start thinking more about getting forward.

The fact of the matter is that the situation of the club was not what it is now for the entire season, yet we've been the same shit team the entire season.

I don't really agree. What's different now is that we have actual names of potential buyers. Everything else is pretty much the same as it was last season, with the competing CEOs, Silvio's lack of realism (and care), a coach who is always on the verge of getting sacked, players bereft of confidence, etc. Remember that Allegri, who is now taking Juve to another league title and most likely the semi-finals of the Champions League, did no better than Pippo. Seedorf didn't improve things much either. I don't think any coach would have done better in these conditions.

This is not all his fault. Not blaming only him for this season. Everyone is to blame. Galliani, Berlusconi, the players, and Pippo. Which is why I'm calling for everyone's head. But I wouldn't trust Pippo even with better players and better management. He is our legend, but he has done nothing so far to prove that he deserves to coach a team like Milan. On the contrary, he has been quite terrible actually. IMO, he needs to go at the end of the season.

As I see it, he has great potential. He became Milan coach too soon, that is something I think we can all agree on, but he could potentially be a great coach for us with a bit more experience. And what better experience than a nightmare season like this? I'd really like for him to get a second chance next year.

[ACMILAN1983]

What makes you think he has potential or could be a great coach?

[nefremo]

I guess we'll have to agree to disagree.

I don't see the potential you see. I hope I'm wrong because he is a Milan legend. But this team has been terribly organized from the very beginning. I agree that Allegri and Seedorf both struggled but they didn't have this same team that Pippo has. I refuse to believe that a team that has these players can look so without ideas and be so disorganized on all ends of the field. I don't think I've seen a single combination play all year. And we are only compact when we get pressed by better teams because we don't have much of a choice.

I'm not judging Pippo on today's game alone. As a matter of fact, like I said earlier, I think he had a plan in the first half. I still believe that the team was set up to do what it did. But I'm judging him on everything he's done so far. He's failed to challenge for 3rd place. He has failed to challenge for 6th place. We are out of the Italian Cup. He has failed to give this team any kind of an identity (are we a counter attacking team? Are we a quick transition team? Are we possession style team? Etc, etc..). He has failed to fix some of the same mistakes we see game in game out. He has NOT improved this team in any way over the past 9 months and if anything we have regressed. He has failed to integrate a single youth player into the team, not even for a 5 min appearance.

I value your opinion and really respect your posts, but based on what's been happening this season....I don't know how he deserves another year or how he has shown any kind of potential to lead a team like Milan in this stage of his menagerial career.

[Gabriel426]

Going to just jump in here and make a general comment bc I actually have not seen 1 min of Milan football this year. The thing is, potential is an interesting word, bc it is very subjective. Truth is there will always be a learning curve and as of now, Milan is a great place both for Pippo and some of the younger players to learn and develop. Judging from the comments and standings, I doubt guys like JM, Guardiola, Carlo, or any other top manager can make a difference.

[Revolver]

It seems that right now the most important thing for Pippo is to keep his chair. Surely more important than to win a game.

This was terrible game by Milan. No attacking plan whatsoever. Let's defend and hope Menez will hit something on a break.

Inter were also bad, but they were unlucky, because honestly they deserved to win this game.

To me it's laughable that Pippo has any potential, let alone a great potential. He's a third rate coach. Based on this season as a whole, there are probably just a few worse coaches in Serie A atm. Like someone said, the whole season, the whole year, the team has no identity at all, no system, the whole year and the guy hasn't decided whether we play with false nine or with true nine. The whole year, and not a single great combination between our players, no team play. We're probably the only team in the world that plays with wingers and has no counter attacking strategy at all. I believe that after this season Pippo himself isn't sure what he wants, and even if you'd give him a clear hands in spending, he wouldn't know what kind of players to get.

[ACMILAN1983]

I want to give devoted_dm a chance to give his thoughts on Inzaghi before I really comment on Pippo, but I will say I'm pretty much in agreement with nefremo and Revolver at this point. I thought there was real improvement in December/January when the side faced Napoli, Roma and Real (interestingly, these are the matches where the team pressed higher up the pitch), but 3 games isn't enough and since then things have really gone downhill.

My expectations aren't huge this season. I had debates with nefremo back in the summer that my expectation for this year was that I didn't think this side was a favourite for CL places and I wasn't convinced there'd be much improvement from last season, so the fact that I'm even more disappointed than I thought I'd be is really saying something about how this season has been.

Anyway, I'm not going to go into too much detail about this match, it's really not worth it, but I did have some thoughts about both teams.

On Milan:

1) There's no gameplan going forward. The team when on the ball doesn't have a clue what to do with it, so possession is usually held deep with either the defence or midfield losing the ball in dangerous positions, or there being little to no progress going forward.

2) Why play on the counter when you're not set up to counter. Menez was literally the only player suited to play on the counter yesterday, yet the team played deep and tried to launch quick attacks. Even if Cerci started this might have been improved, but that's still little to nothing for that sort of game.

3) There's very little cohesion when in possession. Midfielders are all over the place, but rarely in positions to collect the ball. The fullbacks run forward, but on one side you have Antonelli linking with Menez (Bonaventura pretty much linked with no one yesterday), who is totally an individualist and on the other side you have Suso and Abate, who clearly don't know each others game trying to link together. Also, playing with a false nine isn't a problem, IF you have players taking up positions in attack when the false nine moves around.

4) The different departments don't work together. Perfect example is how the attack and midfield tried to press high in the second half, but the defence stayed deep, allowing Inter huge amounts of space to exploit on the counter.

5) The players in each deparatment don't know how to work together. In attack, I can barely think of Suso, Menez and Bonaventura working together. The midfield was similar, they never really understood each others movements or had any structured play. The worst was the CBs though, who almost never played on the same line meaning Inter found it easy to get passes in behind.

6) Diego Lopez saved the team. Even if he's not been great with the ball at his feet this season, I shudder to think what would happen without him.

7) The subs were pointless. Honestly, none of them helped in the slightest. Also, I heard Alex's injury was cramp


On Inter:

1) Without Hernanes they were toothless for the most part. Kovacic, Icardi and Palacio helped at times, but really it was poor from them.

2) The defence is pretty much as bad as Milan's.

3) Their wingbacks were dreadful in every respect.

4) Mancini's subs were pretty much as worthless as Inzaghi's.

5) They didn't seem to show much cohesion. It was either pass to Hernanes or ask Palacio to pull out wide to receive the ball.