[misha]

Udinese vs AC Milan

Serie A 2007/08 - Week 19

Sunday, January 20, 2008

Stadio Friuli

Time : 14:00 (UK); 15:00 (IT)

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The spotlight will be on Alexandre Pato once again when Milan take on Udinese at the Stadio Friuli. The young Brazilian sensation marked his competitive debut for the Rossoneri with a goal against Napoli in a 5-2 victory which was their first at San Siro since last April.

It still wasn’t enough to push them out of the bottom half of the table, although Carlo Ancelotti’s men do have three games in hand on most of the rest of Serie A so it seems only a matter of time before they start climbing the ladder. And the Diavolo will fancy their chances of leaving Friuli with the three points as their away form has been impressive this season.

However, if Milan’s Brazilian trident of Kaka, Pato and Ronaldo aren’t firing then breaking through the Zebrette’s rear guard could prove tough, given that Andrea Pirlo is sitting out a one-match suspension. The man to replace calcio’s equivalent of a quarter-back is Gennaro Gattuso, who has plenty of heart but is hardly the man to unlock a defence with a slide-rule pass. That is expected to be the only change to the starting XI which tore Napoli to pieces.

Udinese boss Pasquale Marino has worked wonders since arriving last summer from Catania, pushing the Friuli boys up into contention for a Champions League spot. Despite usually operating with a three-pronged attack, it is actually defence which has been their strong point this term. A solid backline was certainly needed against bottom side Cagliari at the weekend, seeing as the Friuliani had to play with 10 men for an hour after Diaz Felipe’s dismissal. Despite that, Fabio Quagliarella’s seventh goal of the campaign was enough to secure the victory.

Felipe, as you probably guessed, is now suspended so he will be unable to take on the side who have been linked with a move for him in the past – his indiscipline certainly isn’t doing him any favours, as he now has seven yellow cards and two dismissals to his name this term. Andrea Coda benefits from this and will make his 10th appearance of the season. Gokhan Inler, who had previously missed just one game, also sits out a ban so that hands Finnish ace Roman Eremenko an opportunity to stake his claim for a first-team place.

History doesn’t bode too well for Udinese in this fixture though. Milan’s last two trips to the Stadio Friuli have seen them emerge victorious on both occasions, with an aggregate score of 7-0! Add in a 5-1 home win for the Rossoneri in 2005 and the fact that the Zebrette have gone five years without a victory in front of their own fans against Milan and it doesn’t make good reading for Marino and Co. The neutrals, however, can take heart from this statistic – there has been only one goalless draw between the sides since the turn of the century.

Keep an eye on: Alexandre Pato (Milan) – Who else was it going to be? The kid is mustard and is looking more than capable of living up to the hype, so expect more fireworks this weekend.

Last season: Udinese 0-3 Milan

Form guide: Udinese (L W L D W) Milan (D W D L W)

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Udinese (probable): Handanovic; Zapata, Coda, Lukovic; Mesto, D'Agostino, Eremenko, Dossena; Pepe, Di Natale, Quagliarella

Milan (probable): Dida; Bonera, Nesta, Kaladze, Maldini; Seedorf, Gattuso, Ambrosini; Kaka; Pato, Ronaldo

A must win game against our direct competitor for the 4th place. With Pa-Ka-Ro the sky is the limit.

This post has been edited by mishale: Jan 17 2008, 02:27 AM

[han2503]

You're wrong. Gila is an inbox striker. Pato is both an inbox+outbox striker. Gila is the kind of striker who can only tap or shot the ball into the net, Pato can start a move from outside the penalty area, all by himself, get into the area by dribbling past one or two defender and create a scoring chance. [Milan - Napoli / second half / 77' for example] Gila would never be able to that in a thousand years. not because he is useless, but because that's not what he's supposed to do. he's not able to dribble or even run with the ball.

Pato CAN play as a lone striker. but it's definitely too early for that.

You're saying it yourself here, Gila has always been disadvantaged with the system he's constantly given to play with because he's not the type of striker that can play in that system. Let Gila play alongside Pato or Ronaldo and you'll see his true worth, otherwise he'll continue to underperform.

Gila was top scorer in Serie A while playing as a lone striker ... He just isn't a Milan grade player, that is all.

Put Hernan Crespo up front alone, and watch him knock them in.

I agree with you on this bit, I don't think Gila can handle the type of pressure to shoulder Milan on his own. But have him play next to some one that can support him and split the responsability of the goal scoring with him and he will be back to his best. Look at how he played next to Sheva and how he plays now Next to Ronaldo.

And Crespo is a different type of box striker to Gila and Pippo, he's more in the Drogba mold, meaning he can score from outside the box as well and he can dribble with the ball.

Hernan scored 10. But, that said he scored the crucial goals against united and 2 goals in the final. Plus, he didn't play as often as Gilardino during his spell here (IMG:http://cyrus.medialayer.net/~m1ke/milanfan.com/forums/style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)
Oh yeah, Gila had wingers at Parma (IMG:http://cyrus.medialayer.net/~m1ke/milanfan.com/forums/style_emoticons/default/rolleyes.gif) He only had Morfeo !! And at Milan, he has something better than Morfeo, he has Kaka', Seedorf and Pirlo.

Parma played a totally different system, yes he had Morfeo but they also had wingers and you can't forget that their entire system was based around Gila. Look at how Sheva struggles at Chelsea now that the system isn't centered around him, the same happened to Gila. And not only that we play a system that doesn't suite him at all. A system where 95% of the time he's isolated on his own against 3 or 4 defenders.
And what good are Pirlo, Kaka and Seedorf when most of the time the mids and Gila are 20 meters apart for most of the game? Notice that Gila scores the most goals when Sergio is playing at his best, meaning constantly feeding him crosses from the left.

As u wish ... But I was just underlining that he played as a lone striker at Parma. And was isolated, but still made cappacionare for 2 consecutive seasons.

The system ? What's wrong with the system Kurt ?! This system won us the CL. I strongly believe it is the player that is not Milan quality. Maybe at Fiorentina or Parma, he'll start scoring by the dozens, but the pressure of playing for Milan I doubt he can handle. Especially now that it has been 3 yrs since he joined.

That's the point he wasn't isolated at Parma. You always say yourself that football isn't that simple, and now you're contradicting yourself by saying that because at Milan and at Parma he played as a lone striker then he shouldn't have any problems because it's the same thing. When in reality Milan with the xmas tree play a totally different system to the one Parma played with Gila, even though both played with one striker, it's still a totally different sytem

Gila scored 17 when he played alongside Shevchenko. After that it's the worst Milan of the last decade but only Gila gets the blame "because the others have been here before and should be given some credit for that".
Kaka won us the CL. All on his own.

EXACTLY!!!!! THANKYOU!!!!

and this same system has us mid table in the league. (IMG:http://cyrus.medialayer.net/~m1ke/milanfan.com/forums/style_emoticons/default/rolleyes.gif)

2 years ago when he played with sheva, the system allowed for the team and gila to play well

since then the with this new system we've underperformed as well as gila.

notice the corrolation  (IMG:http://cyrus.medialayer.net/~m1ke/milanfan.com/forums/style_emoticons/default/rolleyes.gif)

EXACTLY!!!!!!!!