Milan crumble: A sharp analysis of today’s defeat

Uncertain behind, imprecise in the middle, blunt in front. The Rossoneri in Genoa have shown their worst face. And in a week with Rome it is already a challenge of in or out. La Gazzeta dello Sport analyses Milan’s collapse.

AC Milan did again. And the fiasco, this time, makes even more noise. Doubts of the season start now become consistency: when the level is raised, Montella’s team end fails to follow. After the Olimpico debacle against Lazio, in Genoa the rossoneri experience another nightmare, the second consecutive in only six championship games. The Champions League train continues to be speed up: to avoid seeing it run away Milan must find itself in a hurry. The red and blacks have a week because the next challenge at San Siro against Roma resembles a last call, and in case of a k.o. the abyss of a crisis can be considered open.

Marassi’s 2-0 defeat does not fully depict the idea of the blucerchiato dominance and of the absolute inconsistency of Montella’s band within the 90 minutes. For the rossoneri not a single shot on goal as it did not happen from August 2015 against Fiorentina and only three ball played in the opposing area in the first 45 minutes, a negative record in the last two seasons of Serie A: numbers that best capture the match of Genoa. Among the controversial formation choices, the cloudy state of team shape and the game approach completely to be forgotten, Montella will have a lot to work to take the vest from this group.

ZAPATA AND THE DEFENSE – Eight goals in six games, still relying on the cold statistics, can not simply be coincidence. And even today, the three centre back failed to neutralize the adversaries, struggling to withstand opposing attackers and falling ruinously in the main moments of the match. Bonucci’s empty intervention with the following Zapata’s assist for Samp on first goal scored is a faithful mirror of the momentum. In particular, the Colombian, preferred for the second consecutive match instead of Musacchio, was the least reliable of the back line, always taken off guard by the fellow countryman with the 91 number on his back.

KESSIE DISASTER – From paradise to hell: Frank Kessie is so, take it or leave it. Against Udinese he had dragged the rossoneri midfield as a tractor, asphalting his opponents with his dynamism and his physicality. What we saw today in Genoa is his most farther relative: inaccurate in support, tactically overwhelmed, never really present in the filter work in front of the defense. If Milan loses its muscles, it also loses matches, and time runs.

SUCCESS & JACK GHOSTS – Berlusconi repeated over and over again: two attackers are needed in front. Real, it must be added, because between the second strikers and playmakers, this Milan remains unfinished. Yes, Kalinic moves, plays with and for the team, but without a nearby partner he suffers from solitude. Suso, who should support him and assist him closely, struggles like a man damned to find his place, retreating to find ball, but without the needed pace to go back to his position quickly. Bonaventura, behind him, is stripped of his central midfielder coverage tasks without being able to distill fantasy and extravagance in the construction phase. Calhanoglu and Andre Silva are watching from the bench. So the rebus is intricate and difficult to solve.