friendly summer games

3rd place isn't bad.

I don't think its an issue of Wenger or Spaletti.

I think Carlo is a remarkable manager. He is able to take a group of players and make a formation that best suits them.

Yes, Carlo prefers the 4-1-2-1-2, a formation I think is great. However, he has shown that if he does not have the players for that formation, he alters the shape.

The other thing that bothers me is that we have never seen our best team out. Never. We've seen a 90% team against Chelsea, and we played fantastic.

I'm not going to pass judgement on Huntelaar because that would be stupid. He started training yesterday. Pato is no second striker, that has become abundantly clear. He is an out-and-out striker in the Ronaldo mold, otherwise, I fear Pato will fizzle out, or worse, do well outside of Milan.

We've played too many pre-season games with half starters, half reserves. It is not good for preparation and it makes us lose games, putting pressure on the team from the media and the fans.

I seriously think we should grab Giovinco, it seems abundantly clear that he's not going to be playing that much at Juve.

To summarize: We conceded 3 goals in 90 minutes. We scored none.

i can't really judge how affective leonardo will be unless he can sign some player that are suited to this idea of football. carlo had to adapt the team to berlusconi prestige buying hence the xmas tree to allow for ronaldinho and kaka to play together , i think carlo would have preferred to buy 2 sb with the money spent on ronnie.

As for giovinco i have always wanted him to play for milan for me he is much better than ronaldinho and g rossi.

Positives.
- Abate again. Press well, work hard and creates nice plays. Well improved from previous seasons. he is like a shining light in this squad, having all the things we seems to otherwise lack.
- Antonini. He does his job well, something we can't say about any other fullback.
- Nesta. Again, him being fit is possibly only thing that can save our season.
- Kaladze. He didn't play.
- Di Gennaro. yeah I know, he had like two moves. But both were good and more than Ronaldinho managed.

Negatives.
- Oddo. I hope he gets caught in a drug control.
- Favalli. He wasn't directly bad, but couldn't we see someone else play?
- Gennaro "Pirlo" Gattuso. All game he played some sort of game he really can't handle. Also looked like someone extinguished the fire in him.
- Ronaldinho, oh ah, what is it good for, absolutely nothing. oh ah. He is trying to reach the levels of local pub football, not bad. He'd like the free beer.
- Hunter. Wasted with this kind of non-existant service.
- Putting Owuwu into the game. sure goal within 5 mintues. I wish I could bet on it.
- Leonardo. Plays Ancelotti formation without a playmaker and Pirlo.

Only at Milan would such terrible form be allowed to go on without substantial action to rectify it.

Originally Posted by Warro Bantan

That's it....another pathetic display, and we cough up another goal....take care folks! All those wanting Carlo out...hope ur happy now!

Thanks Loser-Leo!

Thanks Berlu!!

Warro, what do you expect Leonardo to do? He inherited Ancelottis winless team and lost the best player in the squad. Our results this preseason is actually not worse than last seasons preseason with the infamous 0-5 lost against Chelsea. Leo wanted to play a 4-3-3, but hasn't got any players for that. apart from getting Huntelaar (he wanted Fabiano) he hasn't got anything he wanted at all.
Still the only positive i seen from him is that he seems to trust abate, which in turn have taken his chance.

Ancelotti on the other hand was totally out of ideas and I don't want to think what he would have done with this weakened squad. He no longer could motivate them and always played his favorites.

Originally Posted by NAMMY

Only at Milan would such terrible form be allowed to go on without substantial action to rectify it.

Not true. also this is preseason and we have a arrogant management.

Well Carlo didn't stick with Ronaldinho and Kaka when it was obvious it wasn't working.

Seedorf and Kaka supported Pato. Hell, even Beckham played as a trequartista for us.

I honestly wish Beckham was with us, we may be very combative and have a strong midfield, but it does not pass well.

When Pirlo plays, Milan plays very differently.

Pato is not a second striker, he only has used his "second striker" tag well once this pre-season. Against Benfica, besides that, he was poor.

You see, Pato turns great. He can get past that first guy, even the second. But then when it comes to where he needs to pass, he screws it up. That's why he isn't a second striker.

Ronaldinho is having to come further and further back to do something, and that has never been a good thing. He is playing unselfishly, and then he takes out his need to be selfish on free-kicks, and he's not putting them away.

I would honestly go for some loan deals if I was the management. I'd ask for Giovinco from Juve, I'd probably go for Pasqual from Fiorentina, and I'd take whatever money left to buy Hernanes or D'Agostino, payment plans or something.

I've given up hope on Antonini, and Oddo played well defensively, in spurts, but I guess that's all relative.

How can we possibly blame Leonardo. Like Johncharles mentioned......Leonardo clearly outlined his idea of football. He wants attacking fullbacks that will put pressure on the opponents and fast pace football in the middle.
Yet.....no fullbacks have been brought in. Oddo is simply an embarassment and we won't win anything with players like him, no matter who the coach is.
The menagement haven't done their job and that's the bottom line.

I was one of the people that wanted Carlo out after this year. Not because he is a bad coach.....on the contrary I think he is one of the best around, but he simply wasn't the right one for Milan anymore. Last year + the year before that we played some of the worst football Milan has played in the modern era. Slow, predictable, and hurful to the eyes. That might not change under Leonardo as well, however let's wait at least untill the New Year untill we jump to conclusions. The guy has only worked with the team for about a month now.......out of which countinous training has been the biggest issue. The menagement is so stuck up into this commercial crap, that we had to play a game every two days in America. Where is the continous training in that. I know games are good for gaining match fitness, but not every 2 days. That way the players just get exausted with traveling and crap and gain no conditioning. On top of that, the squad has been scattered because of the Conf. Cup and some key players joining 10 days later then the rest. And now some of them were gone again for International duty. All in all, the pre-season has been crap, both on performance level and organizational level. This team won't get into full stride for another month simply because they haven't had the chance to train continously and grow together both as a team and conditionally. If you look at Inter.....they also look in pretty bad shape for pretty much the same reasons.

To see signs of good physical shape, the team needs to practice 2-3 weeks continously before any friendly takes place. Yet, our team practiced for barely a week and off they went to America. Pre-seasons have sadly become money making periods in football instead of training time.....and that's something a coach can't really control. As soon as I saw the pre-season schedule in June, I thought to myself.....when is this team actually going to train.....and not just travel and play.

All I'm saying is let's give Leonardo some time before we label him a failure. For me it would be impossible to call for his head untill 2-3 months into the season (most of Carlo's seasons all started terribly, just as an example).

No friendlies should be played in July. For 3 weeks, the players should train with themselves. Physical Conditioning, ball work, set pieces, shape, tactics, defending....etc. Games start in August and only 3-4. every week or so, that way you outline what's good and you work on wat's not. You perfect your game and your system. THAT'S the way a pre-season should look like. And not just making money and traveling all over the world. It's ridiculous.

Originally Posted by kris

Positives.
- Abate again. Press well, work hard and creates nice plays. Well improved from previous seasons. he is like a shining light in this squad, having all the things we seems to otherwise lack.
- Antonini. He does his job well, something we can't say about any other fullback.
- Nesta. Again, him being fit is possibly only thing that can save our season.
- Kaladze. He didn't play.
- Di Gennaro. yeah I know, he had like two moves. But both were good and more than Ronaldinho managed.

Negatives.
- Oddo. I hope he gets caught in a drug control.
- Favalli. He wasn't directly bad, but couldn't we see someone else play?
- Gennaro "Pirlo" Gattuso. All game he played some sort of game he really can't handle. Also looked like someone extinguished the fire in him.
- Ronaldinho, oh ah, what is it good for, absolutely nothing. oh ah. He is trying to reach the levels of local pub football, not bad. He'd like the free beer.
- Hunter. Wasted with this kind of non-existant service.
- Putting Owuwu into the game. sure goal within 5 mintues. I wish I could bet on it.
- Leonardo. Plays Ancelotti formation without a playmaker and Pirlo.

Milan lost so much offensive power especially after Kaka's sale,i believe too Nesta and T.Silva is the best but how can they save our season?The only players can save the season are Pirlo and Ronaldinho.we will lose or win the season with them.im afraid our next season depents on them sooo much.

Kris, I think you've been harsh on Ronaldinho, and there many times where he just gave great through balls to Antonini only for him to mess up.

This team is not significantly weakened to the point that Leonardo's results should differ from Carlo's. Maldini might've retired, but Nesta is here to save the day. Plus, Milan has won many critical games, under Carlo, without Kaka.

Dinho has always played poorly when he is the only creative player in that midfield. Watching him have to come back like he does has never been a good sign, not for him, not for Kaka either.

Huntelaar has literally just joined up with Milan. I'm not going to say anything about him, it would not only be unfair, but knee-jerk.

It is clear that without Pirlo this team does not tick. I understand Pirlo was away on duty for Italy, as was Zambro, but, watching our play without them is frightening.

Hell, even Seedorf would have offered something different.

Gattuso should not be played in that role again, ever again. The reason why it worked before was because he had Seedorf sitting next to him.

Our major weakness is our full backs, that is very obvious. It's not just the defending-part of their position, that part, actually isn't as bad. It's that this formation we're playing relies on them being part of the attack, and when they are as ineffective as Antonini and Oddo were today, it invites pressure and we look toothless, even if we maintain possession, like we did today.

Antonini plays better on the right then he does on the left, and I think if I had to pick a starting lineup for Milan against Juve in Berlu Cup, I'd play this:

------------Storari
-Antonini--Nesta--T Silva--Zambro
---Abate-----Pirlo---Flamini
-----Seedorf---Ronaldinho
------------Pato

Abate can take Seedorf's spot and we play Gattuso next to Pirlo. Pato cannot be a seconda punta, he does not make the right choices, ever.

I'm not calling for Leonardo's head. I think he's brought some good things to the squad. However, I think he's put out teams in our pre-season games that probably are not how we are going to play.

4-3-3 might have been Leonardo's idea, but, the sign of a great manager is to be able to take the players he has and utilize them properly. Mourinho wanted 4-3-3, but realized that the players he brought in (Quaresma and Mancini) were not up to it, so he changed the formation to suit his players.

I don't think the squad needs a complete overhaul, well, actually, I don't think we can say whether the squad needs a complete overhaul, until we actually see our real, best starting 11 play. We have only seen that once, and that was against Chelsea. Again, that was a great game from Milan.

As far as pressure on Leonardo, I don't think any pressure should come onto him until our actual season gets underway. He has said he is evaluating players rather than attempting to get results. The press are talking about the losses or whatever, but Leonardo is being smart in just evaluating who he can rely on and who he can't.

The great success story of this process has been Abate.

I think we critically need a FB to help Zambro, and whatever help we do need in midfield will be expressed (by the management) in Beckham's return in January.

The more I think about it, the more it makes sense to grab Giovinco from Juve, they clearly do not have him in their plans. For God's sake they played Iago Falqué instead of Giovinco today.

Samaldinho good point,but the only thing he could do anymore is that through balls.even ikumenda,spelling? impressed me more than Dinho do.he lost many balls,but at least he tried,he tried to run with ball,trying to dribble some players,dribbled some players,but atleast he tried,tried to do something.

i started to like inter,their team B looked much stronger than our team A.

Balotelli,Quaresma,Viera,Santon,Chivu.

all can find a starting place at Milan's 11 easily.

Originally Posted by Rabia15

i started to like inter,their team B looked much stronger than our team A.

Balotelli,Quaresma,Viera,Santon,Chivu.

all can find a starting place at Milan's 11 easily.

Not exactly their "b" team players apart from vieira and possibly Quresma. you took IMO some bad examples of players getting a starting place with us though. Quaresma have been horrible, Vieira as way past it and Chivu wouldn't start with us, apart from as defensive left back.