Played really well in the 1st half. Simply played them off the pitch, no doubt. Though at the time I was thinking we have to score, we have to score this is going to fizzle out. Then when Pato easily beat Gomes for pace and slotted it to Robinho I was thinking this is it, that miss was big though. It practically came off his heel then onto his other leg, that was the real turning point in my eyes.

Zlatan just can't do it against English sides, bar those 2 goals against Arsenal last year he's just terrible. Robinho seemed to give the ball away so many times though was pretty creative in spells. Pato wasn't terrible, there was just no clear chances or efforts. It didn't help Spurs had 11 men back for the whole of the 2nd half. Fair play to Clarence I thought he was brilliant tonight and Silva impressed me (again). Flamini did well for about 60 minutes then seemed like it was a matter of time before the sending off. Merkel did ok for the time he was on, I don't think I saw Strasser touch the ball. Antonini was a strange sub to me, unless Jankulovski was really struggling with his fitness late on. KPB was excellent, again proving his worth. Abate actually didn't do much wrong though was never tested defensively.

I was worried before the game that this could turn into embarrassment by that, I mean comfortably losing 2-0, 3-0 or something at WHL. That didn't happen though. Oh, and how bad was Bale when he came on?! That gave me a bit of comfort.

Fair play to Spurs, in my eyes we were the better side out of the 2 legs, but you don't get anywhere without scoring goals.

We can now focus on the league and hopefully that will turn out good.

I hated to see how often we lost possession so unnecessary.

My goodness Allegri is SUCH A RUBBISH COACH (IMG:style_emoticons/default/mad.gif) Yes people will say we were unlucky and the strikers lacked the finishing touch etc etc.....but the truth is we had no attacking strategy whatsoever.....what was it anyway for the e-tactical pundits of the forum? because I saw none (IMG:style_emoticons/default/dry.gif)

Seedorf was stuck deep in CM where I admit he did admirably but also he had no time or space to provide the killer passes that we've all seen him dish time after time. He played his heart out today in both directions and it's REALLY sad to see us go out without much much of a struggle imho.

Once again iBra has shown himself to be a Swedish Rooney. MASSIVE vs the small league teams and totally invisible when we really need a CF.....AGAIN his and Pato's "partnership" sucked utter and complete monkey balls because I was yelling at my tv the times he could have made a simple lay-off to Alexandre and REFUSED to do it. Yes Pato is brilliant but he's only 21 and when crowded with a fucking catenaccio playing chicken **** team with an alleged world class strike partner who's about as visible as purified air- he's prone to make a couple silly decisions. All credit to him for trying though....except for the silly 40 yard shot....but AGAIN it's those unthinkable attempts that separate the true genius from the ordinary "good" players. Pato got praise for his solo goals vs Napoli and Chievo when in reality the "proper" decision was to pass. You can't have your cake and eat it.

Now back to $h!tlegri.....yeah we lacked a bit of creativity in the midfield but this is ABSOLTUELY no reason not to score a single goal vs Tottenham. Look at the quality of teams tottenham has conceeded goals to recently and tell me with a serious face that we needed Pirlo/Ganso/Lamela/Kaka/Zidane/Riquelme/Ibrahim Ba in midfield dishing killer ball after killer ball for the strikers (IMG:style_emoticons/default/dramaqueensmil.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/guntootsmiley2.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/swear1.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/realmad.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/dry.gif)
Seriously if this guy needs the above to beat Tottenham when HE HIMSELF can say that they're not one of the powerhouses of the CL then he needs to GTFO. Other than the Robinho miss didn't have ONE proper chance for the entire match. That is simply unacceptable. The casual observer will say that we attacked all game but looking at it closely it's ALWAYS the same press press press nonsense that leads to NOTHING. The individual brilliance of Pato and iBra has been saving us ALL season long in Italy. But against any semi decent side (sorry a juve and inter in tatters doesn't count) with a semi organized team and we struggle...and if our strikers can't conjure up the magic it gets ugly.

Enough with the whining about the ref. That's for small teams and loser teams. We got away with quite a few hand balls in the box that a stricter ref would have called and then this "leaving with pride" result would have been exposed for the farce it was. Damn I wish we had Leonard or Ancelotti with this team. Yeah people go on and on about how Leo was tactically inept (incredibly despite it being his first season coaching ANY team)....but routinely excuse each and every of Allegri's fuckups. I'd rather see my team go out with a heavy defeat but showing we could do SOMETHING like we did vs Manchester United than leaving an English team with a clean sheet...but surely I stand alone in my opinion (IMG:http://www.milanfan.com/forums/style_images/bullet/folder_post_icons/icon8.gif)

LOL, there's not much Allegri could have done. He played the best possible formation. You should consider the fact that 70% of how a team performs is due to the players and not the coach. Tonight, we rarely played long balls, which is a novelty. We dominated Tottenham for 90 minutes, and we had about 4-5 real goal opportunities. We didn't win because 1) our most important player was asleep the entire match, and 2) we didn't capitalize our chances to score. Could have we played better? Of course. But given the circumstances, I think we're leaving the competition with dignity.

I still remember we were beaten 4-0 by manchester united at old trafford last season. what do you mean when you say we could do something like we did against them?

Exactly. We did nothing against them. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/laugh.gif)

At least we scored (IMG:style_emoticons/default/happy.gif)

I am so cut as I always am when we get knocked out of the tournament. 3 times by english opposition really hurts, and to be knocked out by this team of plebs is like a dagger in the heart.

When I saw the line-up I immediately had these comments:
Ibra should have been rested at the weekend, we could have won without him.
Robinho should have started on the bench so we could have had a good attacking option to come off the bench.
Boateng behind the forwards because he really gets into the box when we have the ball in wide areas and that what was lacking in this game... Bottom line, we needed PIPPO!!

Anyway, as someone mentioned earlier, the Champions League clearer wasn't part of the season objectives by the higher-ups otherwise we would have signed some good CL replacements considering how many injuries we had at the start of the season.

Some positives for next season include:
Cassano will be available in all competitions
Didac Vila will hopefully be played in some fixtures this season and be our new star left back
We will find a position for Emanuelson and he will be available in all competitions
We will not take up the option to buy Ibra and replace him with a quality striker that we don't need to rely on.

four words:
Play Merkel. Sack Allegri (IMG:http://www.milanfan.com/forums/style_images/bullet/folder_post_icons/icon8.gif)

I think you should sit back and wonder why you are the only one blaming Allegri. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

Haha.. yep.

we REALLY did need pippo. we made some nice crosses into the box but no one was there to finish it. we might as well had played without Ibra. Pato wasnt bad. In fact he did well. If only casssano was able to play instead of robinho, he would have created very nice scoring chances.

IMO our mid field played well. Seedorf was excellent. too bad he cant play consistently like that anymore.

I would include extending the contract of Van Bommel and buying Prince Boateng to that list (IMG:style_emoticons/default/happy.gif) .

This post has been edited by rip: Mar 10 2011, 06:51 AM

it's lonely at the top (IMG:http://www.milanfan.com/forums/style_images/bullet/folder_post_icons/icon8.gif)

Congratulations. Though it's a shame you spoiled a great night by immediately singing about Arsenal. Inferiority complex much?


I fail to see how I was being childish but fine.


Agreed on both counts. Bashing Allegri for this is just bashing him for the sake of it.

There's a few positives to take. A very good performance considering the injuries and we can now 100% focus on the Scudetto (though I would like to win the Coppa even though nobody else likes it! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif) ).

Hopefully this creates a distraction for Spurs and they go out in humiliating fashion in the next round and don't get 4th place so they won't be in it again next season either.

Last bit of Allegri hate for the night...some simple questions will help us put things into perspective?

1. Have we beaten any quality opposition?
2. Do we REALLY need a squad of superstars to beat Tottenham?
3. If we do....do we need a squad full of super stars to score a single goal? Can you name the goalscorers from Wolves?
4. Has our squad and depth improved dramatically improved this year?
5. Is it conceivable that Ronaldinho might have been of assistance vs such a tight defensive team?
6. What exactly is our attacking strategy other than mindlessly pressing?
7. Pato doesn't play well he rides the bench...what about iBra?
8. Have we ever come back to win ANYTHING from a goal down?

This post has been edited by drucurl: Mar 10 2011, 08:34 AM