Banter 2009/2010

Originally Posted by Revolver

I'm with Shegs, he's right. How can be possible that Bayern have the squad to compete with Manchester United and to eliminate them, and we were humiliated by the same Manchester?! OK, humiliation happened because we were without certain players, but we lost at home too and we had almost all players. Look at Bayern's squad, disaster after disaster, bad keeper, average center backs, one side back good, other side back average, we have three (count them, three) defensive mids better than Van Bommel, Pranjic as a playmaker I don't even want to comment, the same Muller as a striker, and Olić is average striker also (he's not better than Borriello) but he's a fighter. All they have are side midfielders, and just one, Robben, their only class player, because whoever watched 90 minutes of Bayern this season sees that Ribery is not more than "good" this season. And also, Abate is MUCH better than Rafael and still Ferguson managed to beat us with Rafael in the team... No one can't persuade me that Bayern has better team than us. No one!

Hmm how can you compare two different games, if Bayern beat Man Utd it doesn't mean they can beat Milan, every football match is unique in its way and anything can happen. Your way of thinking is funny to say the least, we beat Catania away, Catania beats Inter than we must beat Inter right? It simply defies any logic, every match is a different story you can't look on things like that.

Originally Posted by Nalx

Buddy, you claimed to never imply that our team "was/is underachieving" then the next moment you said "we should be on the top of seri A but we are not" That's quite contradictory isn't it my friend?

About "Leo's inability to vary his tactic" I think it has A LOT to do with "ideas on where the team should be". Like in my previous post I siad Leo did have his own idea of playing, he made it known publicly: the Brasil NT 1982. He asked for spesific players "to implement his ideas" and "to create Leo's team". And what did he got? A 3rd choice striker, Gooch (Ouch would be a more appropriate word), and a dentist's bill. If I'm not mistaken Brasileiro said that back then Brasil played with a trequartista instead of two SF like us. Leo didn't whine, he tried his idea with players at his disposal and we sucked. Then against Roma (and Madrid) he opted to play 4-3-3.

That my friend is what I call a variation of tactics.

Surprisingly, it worked mighty fine until December. Suddenly everbody wanted to proclaim their share in this. Heck, Berlu himself said that he was right in believing in Dinho.

Then the injuries set in. Pato and Nesta, both are essential players to our attack and defense, were down injured. Even the back-up players like Becks and Mancini were also out.

Then what kind of "vary his tactics" do you propose? 4-3-1-2 didn't work at all, 4-3-3 needed two SFs to really work. And more importantly, with players that we have now, how will your new tactics succeed?

Dinho was the only creative striker available since Pato out. Klaas, Bori, Pippo are all CF. In midfield, Pirlo and Seedorf, as expected due to their age, couldn't play consistently week in week out. Mancini was supposed to add some flair from the right side, and Becks with his crossings. But they're out. With only DMs more or less fit all the time this season, how are we supposed to try implement some new tactics? And don't make me tell what a joke half of our defenders are.

Here's what Mou said a couple of years ago. "It depends on the quality of the eggs. In the supermarket you have class one, two, or class three eggs. Some are more expensive than others and some give you better omelettes. So when the class one eggs are in Waitrose and you cannot go there, you have a problem."

Leo asked for class one eggs yet he received class three ones. He did all he could with FEW class one eggs he has (Dinho, Pato, Nesta, Silva), SOME class two eggs (Pirlo, Seedorf, Bori, Antonini, and some more), SOME class three eggs (Favalli, Marek, etc), and even DUDS like Kaladza and Oddo.

Now that half of his class one eggs were out practically since new year and yet we're still at #3 with a possibility to win the league (no matter how slim it may seem) how can we not praise him for his excellent job? Mou got almost all first class egges he wanted in Inter and even so they're just 3 points ahead of us (last night result excluded). Isn't that some kind of achievement, some prove from a rookie coach as if to say to his boss "See, imagine what I would've done had YOU given me players I, not you, but I wanted ".

First Leo was belittled, now instead of being thankful, the owner whines and whines everytime he opens his mouth. And instead of backing up the coach, refusing to talk anything but the final 5 games just like Leo's been doing, the president, the captain, the assistant coach all talk and talk about how they hope Leo would stay as if preparing the excuse early on: we want him to stay but HE decides to leave, hehe.

I can't speak for anybody but I think the way Leo was treated after all that he's done is the one that enrages some people here as it gives yet another signal towards what kind of future this club is heading to.

I'm not contradicting myself when i say we're not underachieving, but are not at the top. Over-achieving might even be more apt based on our early season form! but when you can't take advantage of inter's slip-ups 3-games in a row something is wrong. and when your coach insists on sticking a poacher on the right of a 4-3-3 and playing a winger at RB instead of Flamini, you know that that 'something' is your coach!
You also talked about Mou's eggs. In last season's CL semi-finals, chelsea were clearly handicapped but Hiddinks tactics almost saw them through. And Greece won Euro 04 with average eggs cos of proper tactics. My point is with proper tactics, the quality of the eggs dont matter.
P.S.
I think Mourinho was talking about the quality of football, not the results.
Then you talk about variation of tactics. I'm going to avoid the H11 issue, and talk about our most embarrasing result this season. At OT, what was Leo's gameplan? We needed to win and PERHAPS with a less attacking approach we could have gotten the result. Again i'm nt contradicting myself. A 4-4-2 or a 4-5-1 would have seen us choke the midfield and protect the back four, which might have prevented the early goal. Our primary aim that day should have been to avoid the early goal. Best tactic for that; defend and try to make good use of setpieces. A more attacking approach would then be taken in the second half. This tactic might have failed, but i'm not sure as badly as Leo's gung-ho approach.

Brasiliero, just to answer your question...

Thiago Neves is not doing bad at all playing for Al Hilal (saudi arabia)...but he is not world class. They also have Wilhemsson (former Roma player) and he is ripping everyone apart there, he's playing like Messi over there.

With all due respect, I think Revolver is a very biased user and can not separate what he wants from what is needed (see topic Dzeko).

No one can with a normal amount of sanity can ask for Leo to be out unless they had some other things in mind (example - man crushes on Huntelaar).


BTW -- why is Montreal announcing that AC Milan and Fiorentina are coming to Montreal to play against Montreal United (I'm not even sure what our team is called?) on June 2 and May 25th respectively? There's nothing about this anywhere from Milan, but Montreal are gonna sell tickets this week.

I am 50-50 on Leo as a coach, he had his ups & downs.......but point is that, sacking him is a mistake...not that we lose a coach - more importantly we lose the best south american scout ever !!!!

Originally Posted by hitmannq8

BTW -- why is Montreal announcing that AC Milan and Fiorentina are coming to Montreal to play against Montreal United (I'm not even sure what our team is called?) on June 2 and May 25th respectively? There's nothing about this anywhere from Milan, but Montreal are gonna sell tickets this week.

Surely because we're going to have a friendly game there ... At the end of May, we'll play in Washington. This summer, we'll play the Emirates cup in London (with Arsenal and two teams yet to be known).

I don't like Leo because of how he's not used Hunt properly. i've always said that and (if he doesn't deliver results) i'll always say that. What i've never said and won't ever say is that, i don't want him to be our coach because i like the idea he has for the team.

Man, shegs is taking a lot of heavy fire around here. Without trying to turn this into a shouting match, I just want to make a couple of my own points here with shegs.

Look, I think we can all agree on the fact that Huntelaar is not being put into the right situation as a player. He is a poacher, nothing more. And yet our offensive plan does not revolve around him at all. He is often being asked to be a target man or a dribbler, neither role he can actually fulfill. Can you then say that it is Leonardo's fault that Huntelaar is being put into this situation? Perhaps you can. After all, the coach designs the formation. But the part you are missing is that a team cannot be built around Huntelaar. Soccer is a game that involves 11 men per team. One man, no matter how good he is, needs to play within the system to ensure the team's success. Sure, Huntelaar is not a classic target man, but on this team, that's exactly what we need from him and that's why we put him there to begin with. We as a team cannot change the way we play entirely just because Huntelaar is here. Matter of fact, it is Huntelaar that should change the way he plays to fit into the team. It is not fair, but that's the reality of the situation.

And then we move onto Leonardo's coaching of our team overall. I think it would be incredibly unfair to say that he has not done a great job with the team. We are in a position that is much much higher than any of us could have ever imagined coming into the season thanks to his coaching. He revived Ronaldinho's career single handedly and mentored Pato into a fantastic striker. He established a couple of younger players and took out the deadwoods we had in our starting 11. For all those things, he deserves to be recognized for his contributions. Sure, you can say that he has made some mistakes in games, but what coach doesnt? I was watching the ManU vs. Chelsea game a couple of weeks ago and even the great SAR made many mistakes. He left out Nani and Macheda but played Berbatov and Scholes for way too long. The point is, every coach makes mistakes because soccer is an unpredictable game. For Leonardo to make mistakes, it is only natural and we shouldn't be overly critical about them.

Well, i admit Hunt isn't bigger than the system. And everyone makes mistakes at times.
P.S.
Thanks for not 'attacking' me.

http://www.goal.com/en-gb/news/2559/...-summer-report


Looks like we're in for another disappointing summer on the transfer market. Not surprising. I'm so tired of Berlusconi's lack of ambition on Milan's behalf. I really wish he would sell up...

The discussion might get heated and strong words might be written, but it was always intended to "attack" one's argument, and NEVER to oneself.

After all I believe each and every one here shares the same love and wants what's best for this club. That alone should be enough to unite us. So, in short, Forza Milan!!!

come on guys!! cool down the mods though should delete the posts :P i argued heavilly once 2 years ago with a paok fan and they deleted all my posts i remember mrki was on the other guys's side :@

Originally Posted by hishamilan

come on guys!! cool down the mods though should delete the posts :P i argued heavilly once 2 years ago with a paok fan and they deleted all my posts i remember mrki was on the other guys's side :@

Why deleting posts ?
I didn't see any personnal attack (except Drucurl and his sarcastic post).

As long as the debate keeps being polite, I don't see why posts should be deleted ...

I think the debate is great, really nothing personal.

The thing is that, I really don't understand how you still think Leo did not do a good job for Milan.

The thing I really don't understand is that football is not play on paper. Just b/c a team is better on paper does not mean they will perform better on the field.

On top of that, unless the coach made huge mistakes like subbing a defender for a striker while trailing, there is just so much you can fault the coach. I mean, he might not know that his players will stop running in the match or lost concentration for a second. Or just that the other team just simply played better.

As I said earlier in this post, football match is not win on paper, everything is won or lost on the field. And nomatter how much you think it was Leo's mistakes that Milan did not win against teams that on paper Milan should win, give the other team players credit for playing above their level or start blaming the players on Milan for stop competing at the level that they should.

Originally Posted by mrki

... yet another episode of mrki comedy ...

oh my... this is an epitome of a golden mrki post that I am lurking around to catch from time to time

seriously, how pathetic do you have to be to continuously use a football forum for boosting self-esteem with a Mr. know-it-all football expert / prophet speeches?

I mean this guy writes the same crap every time with his management conspiracies and outright delusional prophet stories. Anyway, it's hilarious every time. Thank you mate and keep writing.

Also, massive cheerz to drucurl for some finest humour I've read in a while.

Originally Posted by hitmannq8

Brasiliero, just to answer your question...

Thiago Neves is not doing bad at all playing for Al Hilal (saudi arabia)...but he is not world class. They also have Wilhemsson (former Roma player) and he is ripping everyone apart there, he's playing like Messi over there.

With all due respect, I think Revolver is a very biased user and can not separate what he wants from what is needed (see topic Dzeko).

No one can with a normal amount of sanity can ask for Leo to be out unless they had some other things in mind (example - man crushes on Huntelaar).


BTW -- why is Montreal announcing that AC Milan and Fiorentina are coming to Montreal to play against Montreal United (I'm not even sure what our team is called?) on June 2 and May 25th respectively? There's nothing about this anywhere from Milan, but Montreal are gonna sell tickets this week.

Buy the tickets. MILAN vs DC uniter too so they are coming again but i dont think they will be on the west coast