When Milan's management finally changed managers, I had hoped that it would not be too late to turn the season around. But then they also further destabilized the squad when they changed five players in and out. And while we got some quality players in the deal, they publicly expelled our captain in the worst of ways, which is just bad Karma. Now that Milan have finally played their game in hand and lost 2-1 to Bologna, the chances of us qualifying for the Champions League next year have dropped significantly. Since January, we went from Supercoppa winners and top four hopefuls to a place where hope goes to die.
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| The "Futile Four." Not just killing the hopes and dreams of Milanisti, actually killing football. |
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| 11 Warriors, ready for battle. 11 traumatized, mismanaged warriors, before hope died. |
This was always going to be a difficult match, with Bologna in form, while Milan have been struggling to find their feet again after disappointing results. And the first half was a massive struggle, not just between the two teams, but also with Mariani, the referee, trying to get him to card anyone or make the right calls at all.
Milan came out attacking, with Santiago Gimenez sending his just shot over the bar in the first minute. Thiaw narrowly cleared a shot from Dominguez at the other end. Musah had a great shot in the 16th minute, but Skorupski, of course having returned from injury just in time for this match, saved it. Aside from those few chances, every single play was a foul, it seemed, with too many looking more like mortal combat. With Mariani letting way too many calls go from the beginning of this match, things got spicy very early on.
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| If you picked Musah to have Milan's first shot on target, congratulations. |
In the 19th minute, something happened off the ball where Casale fouled Leão enough to knock him to the ground. Television cameras did not ever show us what happened, but the way Leão got up and was pointing at Casale while lecturing him, it was at least a yellow card offense (but, of course, no card.) Leão never does that. Two minutes later, Castro fouled Leão, clipping him with his boot, and Mariani was nearby, too. Leão was down again, and even needed treatment, but not even a whistle from the ref. Next up, Theo was fouled by De Silvestri. Again, no call.
After Ndoye's shot went wide thanks to Pavlović's intervention, Mariani was called over to the sidelines to talk to Conceição, who was clearly furious with the reffing decisions so far. Mariani probably had no idea that our starting right back, for example, was injured, and if Álex Jiménez or Theo Hernández were injured, he really did not have anyone to replace them with, because management had offloaded our other healthy right back (and captain) to the current opponent. Milan were living on borrowed time, and this injury risk situation was not okay.
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| Leão reassures Italiano that he can still walk, despite being fouled by his player, with no call from the ref. |
Keeping things spicy, though, Leão, in his frustration, elbowed Ndoye in the head while jumping up for the ball, and he didn't get carded, either. On the other side of the pitch, Álex Jiménez was getting tangled up with Dominguez, and the two nearly started an actual brawl. Jiménez is like the polar opposite of Kyle Walker – he's young, fast, and hot headed, and at some point, the hot headed part is going to get us in trouble. But Mariani had long since lost control of the match and was hell bent on not showing any cards yet, so this episode was also fine, apparently.
In the 29th minute, Ndoye fouled Fofana in the box. VAR reviewed it and did not find enough of an clear and obvious error to overturn Mariani's call of no penalty. However, let's be real. We all know that if it had been Inter, they would have gotten the penalty call. Because that's how the Marotta League rolls.
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| Fofana is clearly still learning Marotta League rules. |
And the opposite is true, also. For years now, since someone pointed out that Milan were awarded a lot of penalties in 2020-21, referees have consistently made or not made calls to deny Milan deserved penalties or award the other team penalties more often than not. To the point of making game-changing decisions that have earned them suspensions. Inter fans cry for months if an opposition team gets an undeserved throw in, but Milan's position on the table has repeatedly been affected by referees.
Next violence was Theo Hernández vs. Santiago Castro, and the latter was down, but it seemed like an innocuous collision. Dominguez took a shot, but it was straight to Maignan, so he easily saved it (well, easy for him.) Castro made the mistake of elbowing Pavlović in the face, so Theo helped chase him down and made sure he knew not to try that again. (The extra words and hand gesture were very much appreciated by me.) Ferguson went down in the box while being dispossessed by Thiaw, but it was rightfully deemed not a penalty.
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| I know you didn't try to elbow Beast Mode Pavlović in the face, boy. |
Finally, in the 43rd minute, Maignan sent a long ball forward, Gimenez helped push it forward for Leão, whose speed left De Silvestri in the dust, and he simply went around Skorupski and coolly put it into the back of the net. 1-0 Milan. It sounds simple, but it was actually amazing and kind of came out of nowhere. Theo then also had a chance after that, but Skorupski saved it.
In the second half, Mariani located his cards, and almost immediately started handing them out. The first was to Theo for a foul on Ndoye. Right after that, Castro scored an equalizer to make it 1-1 all. However, there was a fairly long VAR check on this goal, because Fabbian may have handled the ball in his assist to Castro. While some look at the video angle we were shown from the front and insist it was not a handball, I am not totally convinced. I would love to see the other angles and also hear the conversations that were held between the referees on this call. Again, if this was Inter vs. Bologna instead, the Bologna goal would have absolutely been disallowed.
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| A little Leão magic to open up the scoring. |
In the 54th minute, Thiaw was shown a yellow card for a foul on Dominguez. Funny how Mariani showed just three cards near the start of the second half, and then most of the violence calmed down. He could have done that in the first half as well. Conceição brought Pulisic on for João Félix in the 61st. Not sure if starting Pulisic on the bench was because he hasn't been 100% or just a tactical decision, but we did see improvement when he came on.
In the 64th minute, Musah came racing down the pitch, fake his defender three times, then took a great shot, forcing Skorupski into an even better save. He gets a lot of criticism from fans, but under Conceição, he has really been improving so much. Vincenzo Italiano attempted to thwart Milan's surge by bringing on the Milan-owned Pobega amongst his subs in the 72nd. But Conceição answered by bringing on the long lost Jović for Santiago Gimenez in the 76th minute. The Serbian forward almost immediately had a header that forced another save from Skorupski.
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| Same vibes as the fans watching every set piece. |
Disconcerting was in the 74th, when Maignan came out of his area to chase down Odgaard, and then he went down. But he was able to get up relatively quickly and get back in goal and play the rest of the match, such a relief. In the 81st, from a corner, Casale hit the post, and then Cambiaghi sent the rebound over, things were getting more desperate for Milan.
All hope died, however, when Ndoye scored the second goal in the 82nd minute. While being held by Pavlović. 2-1 Bologna. Not surprisingly, he scored as Calabria was waiting to be subbed on. Because Karma works like that. If he or Pobega did not score the goal themselves, then it was the mere threat of his presence that changed the outcome of the match.
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| Calabria got the last laugh at this management in this match. |
So, in the 84th minute, Calabria subbed on, kind of like a victory lap for him. At the same time. Conceição brought Tammy Abraham on for Álex Jiménez, clearly desperately looking for another goal. But that was not to be. While many focused on the fact that it had been 23 years since Bologna had defeated Milan at the Dall'Ara, no one was talking about the fact that it had been 60 years since this team had qualified for the Champions League. People are used to Bologna being a midtable team, but at this point, their club is managed better than Milan. We are fast becoming the midtable team.
Conceição was angry in his postmatch press conference, and well he should have been. He is the least of Milan's problems right now, and sat in front of a press who have been seriously discussing the idea that not only should this ridiculous management sack him already after only two months, they also should sell Theo, Leão, and Maignan this summer. Apparently, it's not just our management who are football clueless.
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| Conceição defending his honor and calling out the press was the real highlights. |
However, it would not surprise me if this management are considering either or both such idiotic moves. After sacking Paolo Maldini, they have gutted the Scudetto winning team until there are only four players left from that side, with Theo, Leão, and Maignan being three of those four. They bragged about their "working groups," but the only way to join their working groups was to have zero experience or even relevant experience for the desired position at Milan.
Gerald Cardinale knew nothing about the sport of football at all just a few short years before purchasing a €1.2 billion historic club. Furlani had zero experience in football, but as a portfolio manager, company man, and Harvard graduated, he was somehow granted the position of CEO at this important club. Moncada never played football professionally, he was just a head scout, looking to further his own career, before being promoted to technical director over the entire sporting project at one of the top clubs in the world.
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| Talks of selling Theo (or not even having renewed him) are why no one will ever take mgmt. seriously. |
Ibrahimović was brilliant as a player, but clearly never paid any attention to anything that did not directly pertain to him at the nine different clubs he played for in seven different countries, but now he is an Operating Partner at RedBird and Senior Advisor to Milan. And not only is he responsible for Abate, one of his best friends, leaving, who is now crushing it at the top of Serie C while Milan Futuro is about to be relegated in the same group, he also is responsible for us not even having a Sporting Director currently, having pushed D'Ottavio out. Because he does not play well with others and everyone is disposable to him.
Contrast that with the previous management. Gazidis had 30 years of experience, most of it exactly what he did at Milan. Paolo Maldini had a lifetime of experience in football as the son of a player and manager, then 25 years at the highest level of football, winning everything and captaining Milan, and then was a father to a footballer as well. Zvonimir Boban also played at the highest level of football, had experience in sports Journalism and at FIFA before arriving at Milan.
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| Such an amazing Sporting Sector, all of whom worked together so well to create success. |
Ricky Massara played professionally, briefly managed a couple of small teams, then studied under Sabatini for a number of years while he became certified as a Sporting Director, then was actually Roma's Sporting Director before coming to Milan. Even Moncada worked for ten years in the only area he had experience in: scouting. All of them brought so many lifetimes of footballing experience to the table, and worked well together, too, to build a cohesive, successful project.
Instead, we are stuck with this impatient group of football clueless narcissists who insist on doing everything their way (even though they don't know what they're doing in the least,) and would have a transfer window monthly or even weekly for underperforming players if they could. They have less understanding of how to build a team than the average fan online, and do not even understand the word "accountability." Their tolerance for mediocre or worse football is impressive until it starts to impact their objectives or the fans say mean things about them. Then they blame the players, or talk about how they didn't learn how to deal with mean people at Harvard.
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| This team are constantly undermined by their own management so that hope just dies now. |
It is this environment that players have come into, signed contracts with, are sacrificing their families and lives and careers for. And if there is a poor performance, no matter who or what was responsible, they get yelled at by these arrogant people, who don't even know how to do their jobs. And then everyone asks them why they can't just be consistent. Because they are traumatized day in and day out by the mixed messages, the constant inconsistencies and every transfer window from management, and the complete lack of empathy from the people they work for. No matter what Conceição does, or what Pioli did before him to try to keep mentality and performances up, Milan is no longer a place to dream. It is a place where, whether you are a player or a fan, hope goes to die.
This post inspired by the music of Måneskin's "The Loneliest"
Serie C Week 28
Reviewed by Elaine
on
11:30 PM
Rating:
