True the players didn't help out, but I feel like there's a general confusion about each player and their role. Bonucci was all the way up near the opposition's box on their 3rd. Just makes no sense for him to push up so high when you're a 2-0 and still have nearly 45 minutes left to play. Same goes for the 4th.

I think the 4-3-3 is really not helping matters. Bonucci is clearly more comfortable in a back 3. He just looks flat footed atm. Musacchio also looking very suspect. I can't tell if this is because they're getting continually exposed by their midfield and FBs pushing too high, or because they're not yet comfortable with each other and the system or a combination of both.

Kessie is another huge problem for me atm. One moment he does something great, blink and he's messing up. His inexperience is really showing through imo

Cutrone, I've probably said this a million times, but I'm going to say it again, we can't get ahead of ourselves about this kid. He's deadly in front of goal, he's clearly got the instincts but he's just not involved in the general play, which is problematic. So my question is, why do you use him instead of either Kalinic or Silva who have far more experience and are both good in the build up? Cutrone might be good against teams like Crotone when we have 10 players in the opposition's half but he's not ready for a game like this and Montella should have recognised this before hand. I honeslty feel sorry for Silva. For me he's one of our most exciting signings and he's being left out.


True, but imo we showed more signs of life once they came on. Not saying it's not partly due to Lazio handing over the reigns but we actually managed to combine a couple of plays.


The man I'd really want for this job would be Conte. We have a team designed for the type of game he likes to play. Sadly he's unreachable. Carlo has a very different philosophy. I don't think he's switch to a back 3 either tbh


Why Calabria? I didn't think he was that bad, his defending needs more work sure, and it's obvious he's not yet cut out for these games. My question is why not Abate? Why go for the inexperienced kid against the tough opponent FFS? Montella's choices have really been baffling to me as of late.

So, my match ratings here:

Donnaruma - 5.5 - couldn't do much, but didn't look particularly good with the corner crosses coming in

Calabria - 5 - defensively unreliable and offensively unattractive
Bonucci - 4 - very bad performance, he has to up his game quickly
Musacchio - 5.5 - sleepy and slow from time to time, not particularly good game
Rodriguez - 5.5 - a bit more reliable defensively then Calabria, yet no offensive effect
Biglia - 5.5 - as a metronome he was way too slow, but still an upgrade compared to Monto
Montolivo - 5 - like a ex-player who from time to time shows glimpses of his past prime
Kessie - 4 - definitively the weakest link, countless wrong passes and runs, beside the crucial stupid penalty
Suso - 5.5 - not present for most of the game
Borini - 5.5 - same as Suso
Cutrone - 5.5 - too green to start such a match I guess, no argument here

Calhanoglou - 6.5 - actually did well but it was much too late
Kalinić - 6 - nothing special
Bonaventura - no rating

First Kessie. I get your general sentiment, but the thing is, hes doing far more studip game-deciding errors then good things. So far he costed us 2 goals and I'm becoming more and more sceptical.

Conte would be good but he has clear limitations. Maybe he'll leave Chelsea and we could try get him but its unlike. Ancelottiwould mean a lot of emotions and - a thing we sorely need - experience, after so many rookie, starter or inexperienced coaches.

Montella will be sacked by November. I don't think he has what it takes to lead a great team in the making.

His inflexibility at changing formation, his continuous mistakes at picking players, his inability at giving this team an identity (especially since we made most of our signings in July and he had all the time in the world to think everything through).

It's truly sad to see our attack being led by Borini and Cutrone when we've spent +200 million. It's sad to see a washed-up Montolivo being the leader in our midfield. It's sad to have players like Abate, Calhanoglu, Bonaventura, Kalinic and Silva sit on the bench in such a difficult and crucial fixture.

We truly lack a great coach.

But I think you guys are putting way too much faith in the 3 backline. I mean Bonucci has been poor so far, and it's a bit funny how we all suppose he's "unconfortable" playing the back 4. If he's so damn good as he made me think he is and we all hoped for, he should really perform well along with Musacchio, Rodriguez, Abate/Calabria/Conti in a back 4 as well.

Sure, with both fullback being offensively attuned and Bonucci having played this system for years, it's crazy not to try this 3 backline. But Bonucci has to step up now, so far he's really disappointed me.

I never believed that story. A great defender performs well regardless of the system.

So the question is - and I'm being intentionally provocative and radical - is Bonucci really a great defender?

We'll see what happens with Montella, I'm not convinced the management will go all gung-ho on sacking him as their options are limited.


Agreed that Bonucci has been disappointing. He's been cocooned in a specific system for a long time both with Juve and Italy. For me, I think he's much better in a back 3 and this was also apparent at Juve. I think Bonucci is a decent stopper, but what makes him so great is his passing and ability to move forward out of defence and right now we're not exploiting that as he's not free to do what he's great at. Him and Musacchio both have looked flat footed. They're both very good individual defender but I feel like atm they're not connecting, and imo that's one of the most crucial aspects in a CB pairing/trio. Montella has had a lot of time to get this to work, but he's shifted the defence around in each of the games. He can say rotation until the cows come home, but the defence is just not an area you can mess around with, especially when all 4 are new players to the team and to each other.

I think a back 3 will fix a lot of our problems, not to mention we can move away from the 4-3-3 which is literally killing us. Suso is probable the only player that benefits from this formation currently, the rest look like they're square pegs in round holes. I even think there are back 4 formations which could work much better than a 4-3-3. A 4-3-3 without wingers is literally shooting yourself in the foot, and why a coach like Montella who came onto the scene as this innovative and adventurous coach, fails to see this is beyond me


Just look at what he says here

“I would field the same players if I had to make the decisions again. In my view, these were the best players for the situation. Patrick Cutrone is in better shape than the other strikers, Jack Bonaventura was coming back from injury, Hakan Calhanoglu wasn’t at his best, playing for his country with a knock.

“I thought on an individual level that Lucas Biglia and Montolivo had good performances. The issues were elsewhere.”

Physically, the team is fine, it was a psychological drop-off after the penalty. When your head isn’t on point, the body won’t follow


I'm sorry but how can he say this after what we all saw?

First off, the penalty wasn't what started the downfall, we started to play like cr@p after the brief stop when Bastos came on. And I pointed it out here actually saying that it looks like we can only maintain the good performance for 20 minutes (which is also what happened against Cagliari)

Second, how can you insist that you wouldn't change anything about the line-up? There were players on the pitch that were clearly not up to the task. Cutrone was very obviously out of his league out there. Borini is an attacking version of Poli, he contributes absolutely nothing to our game aside from useless running

Third, Montolivo was not good, no. He destroys the entire flow of our midfield with his super slow thinking and decision making. How can he not see what is obviously in front of him? Montolivo is at the core of what is wrong with this current Milan. Picking the inferior player to the one on the bench is a fatal error imo.

Same goes with Calabria. Why wasn't Abate picked? The player who has far more experience and is far more solid defensively than Calabria. I'm not going to be overly critical on Calabria, I think he's talented, but he looks like more of a WB to me than a FB. His defensive duties are at times abandoned and he tends to leave wide open spaces behind him

I agree about Kessie. I don't like the fact that we have no one to really replace him, to me it's bad that we have a 20 year old who is made an undisputed starter as this tends to also effect his performances. Maybe Locatelli can be tried out there, give Kessie a bit of a slap in the face because atm it looks like he's sleeping

Excuses, Han. Excuses. Montella is a small coach who's incapable of seeing his mistakes and taking the blame.

I think he's a great overall player, I never regarded him as a great stopper (just that). I in fact called him Bone head Bonucci many a times here (check my posts).

And I think a back 3 is where he excels. He's played a bad 4 at Juve with success, sure. But he was in their Juve bubble, a system that is solid, we're not that, our midfield is non-existent right now and the defence is getting continually exposed, and this is exposing his flaws which were well covered at Juve

So we're back to the midfield question. Right back what I told you guys some weeks ago. Lucas Biglia won't solve half our problems there. IMO this is where our summer market failed.

Biglia is a very good player, and he's miles ahead of what we've had these last few years. But him alone won't solve all our problems, no.

I think the system is messed up atm, and Kessie is not living up to what we're expecting, certainly not in these last 2 games.

Playing Monto in there doesn't help matters much either

I agree that we should have done more in the midfield. We should have gotten a better mezzalla and someone who can give Kessie some sort of competition for his place. Maybe we'll do something here in the winter, but imo this group is much better than what we had last season and atm they look just as bad as what we did have last season. Montella is the one who has to figure out the right combination and decide which players complement each other and which don't

I don't think anybody expects Biglia to solve our midfield issues. They can only be solved by playing the right system with the right players. Because at least now we don't have anymore the excuse of a crappy team.

Well, we signed Hakan - a real gamble, an inexperienced kid who's had just one good Serie A season prior to transfering to us and Biglia, the only seasoned and experienced player for midfield.

Biglia should clearly be a metronome and substitute Montolivo. But next to that I only see problems. We have Hakan who IMO functions best when played deep down along with Biglia as kind of a "German 6" (a position played by Did Hamann for example), the problem is the pairing of Hakan and Biglia lacks strength and defensive solidity.

Next we have Kessie who - and I'm really jumping ahead here - appears to me as a jack of all trades, a player who might be great with Atalanta but seriously questionable with more ambitious teams. His defensive work is bad to say at least, which is unfortunate - because he has power and strenght and could easily be the next Desailly. But his offensive work leaves also much to be desired, I mean he makes good runs and passes but that's not enough for the modern offensive midfielder to cut the curve. All in all Kessie is, it seems to me, unable to occupy about 75% of the positions in midfield because of some disadvantage. That makes me seriously question him.

I disagree.

Firstly, I don't think Hakan functions best as a deep-lying midfielder. He's always been an advanced midfielder. That's where he best expresses his qualities.

Secondly, I don't agree that Kessie is bad defensively. On the contrary, his strong physique and stamina is what made him excel at Atalanta as part of a double-pivot alongside Gagliardini in front of a 3-man defense.

At this point I think it goes without saying that we should switch system as follows:



That is a very solid formation IMO.