Milan vs. Cagliari Preview: Bring on the Vagrants

Tomorrow we are hosting a bunch of homeless people. Theirs is an epic story of the kind one only finds in Serie A, as they are currently technically without a home stadium to play in – at least one the fans can watch them in. And on Sunday, they lost a potential 3 points because of it, too. Which means they are a well-rested bunch of vagrants, likely angry because of everything that happened, too. So Milan are really going to need to step it up to be able to conquer the homeless team. Bring on the vagrants!

The homeless team is coming to OUR house

Why are Cagliari homeless? Last season, their stadium was deemed no longer safe, so they finished out their season’s home matches playing in "nearby" Trieste (over 500 miles away.) But the home fans wanted to be able to play in Cagliari. Cellino, their club president, tried to get approval to build a new stadium, but the city denied it. So while their old stadium is being repaired and upgraded, he decided to take this field, basically a park, and turn it into a temporary stadium so home fans didn’t have to travel:

This would become a stadium?

With construction nearly complete, and a game already played behind closed doors because the FIGC did not approve the stadium’s use yet due to fan safety issues, on Sunday, they were meant to have hosted Roma. Despite the FIGC’s ruling, Cellino invited season ticket holders and those who had already purchased tickets for this match to come to the game. Giancarlo Abete, FIGC president was having none of this rebellion and postponed the game, which was later officially forfeited and a 3-0 win awarded to Roma.

The transformation nearly complete, but deemed not safe for fans yet

God bless Cellino. I thought that we were stuck with Zamparini, De Laurentiis, and Lotito as the craziest club presidents, but after some great sound bytes in the past, he has secured his place with the best of them. Read the papers to see just how crazy he is, we really need to make a Lega Serie A reality show with these guys in their meetings and such, I bet every team could build a new stadium and then some with the money from a show like that.

Unfortunately for us, we are going to face the wrath of those players scorned by their own president and circumstances tomorrow, and I am not looking forward to that. I mean, sure, this story replaced all of the Allegri-Pippo gossip, so our guys can be a little more focused, but Cagliari are also rested. And despite the fact that as of this writing, Allegri is suspended for insulting the refs on Sunday, I’m sure they wouldn’t mind taking down the club of their former coach, too. They also have yet to record a win this season, so I’m going to guess that the homeless team is hungry for Milan blood.

Davide Astori... will Milan be made to pay for the one that got away?

Coach Massimo Ficcadenti will likely play a 4-3-3 formation tomorrow with a starting lineup of Agazzi; Ariaudo, Pisano, Rossettini, Perico; Nainggolan, Conti, Ekdal; Cossu, Ribeiro, and Pinilla. And don’t forget he’s got Milan youth product Davide Astori who he might put on to face his old team at the San Siro.

Allegri Tassotti will be without the services of Zapata and Boateng due to their single game suspensions, but on the flip side, Robinho is expected to be fit again. The question is whether or not he would play from the start or sub on later in the match. And the other question: What formation will they put out?

Allegri will have to sit this one out... is it an audition for Tassotti?

My guess is a 4-3-3 like Sunday, with Abbiati, De Sciglio, Mexes, Yepes, Mesbah; Montolivo, Ambrosini (De Jong), Nocerino; El Shaarawy, Pazzini, Bojan. Okay, maybe a lot of that lineup is wishful thinking, but what else do we have left this year but our imaginations?

One thing is for sure, a lot people are afraid of homeless people, but this team, we should definitely fear. With Cellino ranting on and on and a team full of players with no stadium, they will have no qualms about embarrassing their former coach, even if he’ll be in the stands. But despite the curse of the San Siro still having not been broken, I wouldn’t rule out our boys, either. You got homeless? We lost half our family, our daddy and mommy are fighting all the time and daddy is broke, and we’re well on our way to another 307 injuries this year. I’ll see your homeless and give you home field. A field that is waiting for us to conquer it, and take you down along with it. Okay, I don’t really have that much optimism for this match, I just want to see more improvement, but it feels good to pretend to believe again. Bring on the vagrants!

This post inspired by the music of the B-52’s

Milan vs. Cagliari

Wednesday, September 26 • 20:45 CEST (2:45pm EDT)

This match will NOT be shown live in the U.S.

Please check for streams before game time