Project: Disasterclass
Shape Shifting
After the disappointing 1-1 draw season opener against Torino, Milan were back in action this time away to newly promoted Parma. Okafor after his equalizer the previous week was given the nod up front to lead the Milan line due to the injury of Morata. After Torino exposed some glaring holes in Milan’s team, Fonseca opted for what he believed to be a more balanced lineup with Chukwueze being dropped to move Pulisic back to RW and move RLC from the position of a double pivot midfielder to a CAM behind Okafor. Changes in the middle of the park were also present with Reijnders and Musah coming in for Bennacer and the change of position for RLC. Theo returned to the starting lineup at LB after the failed Saelemaekers experiment and somewhat surprisingly after his horror show against Torino, Milan skipper Calabria kept his place at RB. New signing Pavlovic got his first start in Serie A for the dropped Thiaw.
Straight from the kickoff Milan’s shape was a shambles. Parma recovered the ball from an RLC handball and immediately cut Milan open with a 4 pass move that took them from their own box to just outside Milan’s 18yrd box were Calabria again was out of position, isolated and burned for pace. The fault is not all on Calabria, but the entire defensive line! Milan had 9 outfield players in Parma’s half, without being in possession of the ball, 3 of which, Tomori, Pavlovic and Theo were all on the left side touchline which allowed a criminal amount of space for a simple cross field ball to expose Calabria. Once the ball was over to Calabria’s side Valeri made easy work of him and cut the ball across the box for an easy tap in. Theo this entire time was at jogging pace and was supposed to be marking the eventual scorer Dennis Man. This was the second week in a row where Theo had showed no desire to carry out his defensive duties and looked labored and out of shape on the pitch.
A Leader Knows The Way, Goes The Way And Shows The Way
Milan immediately after going behind showed their inexperience by rushing to try and get an equalizer despite there being the entire 90 + minutes still to play. Every possession was too slow, players holding onto the ball too long and what we came to see as the norm under Pioli was individuals trying to win games. Too many occasions players like Pulisic, RLC, Reijnders, Leao all got caught in possession very easily and immediately with Milan playing such a high line were exposed and routine balls over the top left Milan struggling to catch Parma on the counter. This game was a clear indication of a team poorly setup from the tactics given to them by Fonseca but also a team, with the exception of Pavlovic and Mike, showing no work rate or on field organization to affect change. There is currently NO LEADER in this Milan squad and as a result the teams mental fragility is all to apparent to see.
This weakness in mentality saw the team revert to what they know which is individual performances to win games. All too often in the game we saw a team devoid of ideas going forward and, on every occasion, when they entered the opponent’s half, every outfield player was static to their opposite marker. No player moving into space to create for others, no quick passing to unlock marking positions. Just slow static predictable plays which at any time given our high line was easily countered when possession was lost. This was in stark contrast to the preseason where we saw several of our youth players take control of the play, Liberali in particular showing glimpses of what could be achievable under a possession-based system with quick players able to make space and let the ball dictate where and how high up the pitch players should be.
To Be The Man, You Got To Beat The Man
Instead, we were subjected to several of our high-profile players showing very little effort to affect change. Theo and Leao in particular are showing signs of again, like in previous seasons coming into the season out of shape and visibly carrying extra weight. Both their demeanor and work rate on the field were embarrassing to watch. These are senior players in the Milan team who have been here for a long time, and have no excuses. Both know exactly what it means when wearing the Milan shirt and should be setting the example for the youth coming through and also to the new players we brought in. Leao in particular, often criticized from the Milan fan base is slowly becoming a caricature of himself.
Predictable in play but also predictable in how he sees himself in this Milan team. He sees himself as a leader, the highest earner in the team, and is allowed freedoms on the pitch not offered to other players in this team or to his peers in other top sides in Europe. But he simply falls short in his ability to command a game, to generate any belief in his team mates and his response in many games is to take the ball and run into defenders, who have figured out despite his tremendous physical gifts he is easily nullified when you prevent him in getting into isolated 1 on 1’s or double up which on many occasions Parma did, as there was no other goal threat coming from anywhere else.
Fofana And Royal Debut With Mixed Performances
New signings Emerson Royal and Youssouf Fofana were introduced in the 2nd half with the latter proving he could indeed have a big impact in this team. On his introduction to the game his first action was to notion to Tomori to hype the guys up and get into the game. When receiving the ball most of his actions where to quickly move it on generating space for others and then quickly closing down when out of possession. He was seen motioning to Pulisic during one of the cooling breaks to get into space for him to unlock, this is great to see from a new player coming in and trying to make a mark but also a worry that none of our other seasoned players are offering this type of influence.
Royal however, had a nightmare start. He looked nervous in possession and gave away some early cheap passes but looks physically more of what we need on the right to replace Calabria, but has to improve quickly and adjust to Serie A. He was caught out of position for Parma’s 2nd goal, not entirely his fault. His instructions from Fonseca were to push high and Leao made a risky and quite frankly a poor cross under hit when Royal was running full steam into space. The resulting turnover exposed the same issues seen all game, Milan pushing too high, Tomori and Pavlovic being forced to try and close down the space and again a slow jogging Theo far post, out of position and allowing his man to escape his watch with literally no challenge.
Balance Is Not Something You Find, It's Something You Create
All of these issues point to a team that is unbalanced and quite frankly underprepared for the task at hand. This falls to the responsibility of Fonseca and his coaching staff to resolve. Post game he mentioned that the team were well prepared and showed what was expected of them in training all week but during the game the gameplan went missing and he could not explain it. Confusingly, Musah stated in a post-game interview that on the field he was unsure when to press and when to track back. These comments are worrying as they paint a striking similarity with the issues serval players faced under the end of Piolis reign, notably being unsure what their role on the field is. This indicates a lack of understanding of what the coach is trying to instill but also the players themselves have to be accountable and put the game plan into action.
Fonseca has to accept responsibility for both these poor showings as he has had options available, but he chose only to either play unfit, unmotivated players or players out of position despite knowing their conditions ahead of the games and their peformances in previous games proving unfruitful. Taking RLC as an example he has neither been a success as holding midfielder or CAM either under Pioli or Fonseca. He had the option to call up Liberalli if the plan was to play with a proper No10 and moving Pulisic to RW but decided again to play a player in an unconvincing role on the pitch. He has now had 6-7 weeks with this team and we should be starting to see progress and an identity on the field.
Identity Crisis
Which brings us to the real problem here. One of the factors in Fonseca’s employment was he used a similar 4231 formation with Lille and this presented Milan with a coach familiar with that system. However, as we saw under Pioli, a 4231 system in this team is simply unsustainable and is a disaster given the squad of players we have. For a system like that to work it requires the front three to work incredibly hard both offensively and defensively given the lack of security in midfield with just two holding players. Our current forwards such as Leao, RLC, Chuku and Pulisic all fail in being hard enough workers for both defensive and offensive phases of their game. For the two holding positions we currently only have one who has the legs, desire and qualities to play there and that is Fofana. Bennacer used to be that guy but is no longer the physical force he was prior to injury.
All of our other options are essentially box to box midfielders with no desire to participate in the defensive solidarity of the team. If Milan are incessant on playing a front three with Leao in the team, then there has to be sacrifices in other areas of the field. Most notably the middle of the park, Milan’s weakest spot. Reverting to a 433 is one option where there HAS two be two ball winners and one creative from that to link up top. Fofana has to be paired with another high energy physical ball winner, Musah has the potential to be that guy but needs direction on the field from another leader to succeed. Likely Reijnders would be the creative ball playing midfielder to link with the front three, very reminiscent of the approach Milan took with Ambrosini, Gattuso and Seedorf as the engine room to complement the legend that is Kaka and Shevchenko respectively.
Time To Get Tough
We are also seeing a lack of team cohesion due to management again for the third successive season failing to give the new coach a settled set of reinforcements early in the transfer window and now they are playing catch-up to gel whilst trying to work under a new set of coaching staff. All in all, the current setup is a mess that needs rectified immediately and some changes of attitudes are required but also the harsh realities that our system and personnel have to change in order to create a “TEAM” worthy of wearing the Milan shirt. The talent is there, its obvious, but simply doing the same thing with another coach at the helm is the definition of insanity. I see similarities with Fonseca when Milan in 1996 brought in Oscar Washington Tabarez from Cagliari to replace the outgoing Capello. Gone was the no nonsense man management approach that Capello was famed for and replaced by a softer spoken and reserved character in Tabarez. Milans team at that time had won it all and had a squad of ageing winners who lacked motivation and change was needed, but Tabarez’s term was short lived, failing to instil his philosophy and authority on that team and was subsequently let go after a few months. Fonseca has to command the respect of the dressing room and make examples of players who are not giving 100% otherwise his Milan tenure will be short-lived.
Forza Milan
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