Hey, New Guy

So for reasons unknown to football or humanity, once again, Berlusconi set the clock back to Year Zero this week. I mean, Welcome Mister Brocchi. It’s just hard to get excited in any way whatsoever about a new coach when we all know what is coming. I’m sure that Brocchi’s complete lack of Serie A experience will not stand in the way of the many, many successes he’ll have… in his six games plus a cup final that he’ll be coaching the first team for. And I hope he’s not offended by his name just being scribbled on masking tape on the door of his office or whatever at Milanello, but Silvio spent €150m on the club last year, so there is neither time nor money to get a nameplate engraved for him. I mean by the time it was ready, his contract would already be up. So it is with heartfelt sincere half-assed superficial emotion that I offer the best welcome I can for an interim/caretaker coach: “Hey, new guy.”

The masking tape says it all.

This is where I would normally research the new coach’s career as a player, manager, how he grew up in Milan’s youth sector, and maybe something about his personal life. But hey, you can Google all that if you want to, right? By the time I get done writing this post, there will be a new coach, anyway, so I may as well skip the formalities. Besides, an interim coach is a lot like a desperate one night stand… don’t ask too many questions, and don’t get too attached.

So the new guy, whatever his name is, gave a press conference yesterday. There were words. Lots of words. Mostly words that sounded a lot like Berlusconi himself. But that’s what you get when you hire a company man. Only heaven forbid that company man has his own mind, like Seedorf did. Or does exactly what he’s told and still fails, because he did exactly what he was told, like Inzaghi. Galliani fought to keep Mihajlovic through the end of the season, while Berlusconi wanted to give Brocchi a contract for a year and two months, so sacking Mihajlovic and giving the new guy only a 2 month contract was actually a compromise between sanity and wherever the hell Berlusconi’s head is anymore.

Hired because he has less hair than Berlusconi?

I have been so underwhelmed by Brocchi’s mind-numbing words so far that I fell into a coma. A coma I doubt I will awake from until some level of competency in management is achieved. Unless Brocchi’s football is just breathtakingly fresh and amazing, I am sure this coma will continue through at least May 21st. But hey, Mister, welcome to the first team. Feel free to bring me out of this club-induced coma. It would be a miracle of both medicine and football.

This whole debacle also confirms why Berlusconi should never have access to the interwebs. I’m sure he saw the idiots who said they wanted this change and assumed that those trolls represented all Milan fans, but he was so wrong. So many of them did a 180° turn when Mihajlovic was actually sacked and Brocchi promoted anyway. So Berlusconi completely lost the fan base, and we all lost a proper coach and any chances of doing anything for these next six games or the Coppa Italia final. But I’m sure Brocchi will be great. Really.

The official Milan photographers being kept busy with the handshake photos these past few years

I’ve already seen people deluded into thinking that because Brocchi was a youth coach, he will play youth players. Really, people? Inzaghi was our coach just a year ago… you’ve already forgotten? Brocchi is going to do exactly what Berlusconi says, which definitely doesn’t include youth players. Certainly, that is one thing that Mihajlovic did that must have ruffled Silvio’s feathers. But Brocchi is a nice guy. A very boring, but very nice guy. And we all know where nice guys finish… last.

Welcoming this coach under these circumstances ranks similarly in my book to crawling under a house with a sewage leak, evacuating constipated zoo animals, or being trapped in a box of cockroaches for two months. It’s certainly not Brocchi’s fault. Other than the fact that he didn’t have the balls to tell Berlusconi that he was making an epic mistake and refuse the job. I mean he claims he’s doing this for Milan, but everyone knows that it was absolutely the wrong move for Milan at this point. Even Galliani. Even Galliani, Mister Brocchi. When you can’t even see what he gets right, I simply cannot believe my beloved team is in good hands for even one second. But welcome anyway, I guess. It’s not like I have a choice. Hey, new guy.

This post was inspired by Muzak

Our next Year Zero match is

Sampdoria vs. Milan

Sunday, April 17 • 20:45 CEST (2:45pm EDT)