Question: Pato as a regular!

Could he and should he be a regular at his age?? What do you think?

I'm not quite sure... I think he's a bit too young to start playing every week.

50 pages on Pato and yet he played just a sinlge game for us 

Shevchenko or Kaka are nowhere near after their first games for Milan.

However I do remeber Kaka on his first game for Milan - a rainy evening in Ancona, not the best pitch in the world. Never seen him playing before didn't took me long to relaize that this brazlilian youngster was a pure class - natural daiamond. And was confident he will rule our game in the years to come.

Guess I was right 

I've seen Pato in action - @ the World U20's and some videos of him. Was quite aware what I could expect from him and wasn't surprised from  his performance last night.

Ant yet my fellow rossoneri I've no doubts that this boy could become one of the greatest players not only in the hisotry of AC Milan but of course in the history of world football.

He is only 18

So  the logic of football says that in the next 5 years he could only get better and better.

Normally a footballer is reaching his peak no earlier than at 23 -24 years of age.

As someone mentioned - he already has the skills of all round completed striker. what he needs to develope is his strength, muscules, and most importnalty to keep his mind cool on the pitch.

I'm really scared to think what he would look alike on the pitch 5 years from now.

From where I'm standing now I could easily see him as the No 1 goalscorer for  Milan of all times  in the next 10 years.

Question: Pato as a regular!

Could he and should he be a regular at his age?? What do you think?

I'm not quite sure... I think he's a bit too young to start playing every week.

Question: Pato as a regular!

Could he and should he be a regular at his age?? What do you think?

I'm not quite sure... I think he's a bit too young to start playing every week.

So do you know his song? Olé... olé... olé... PA-TO! PA-TO!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eHkr8jSOrgQ&feature=related

Question: Pato as a regular!

Could he and should he be a regular at his age?? What do you think?

I'm not quite sure... I think he's a bit too young to start playing every week.

So do you know his song? Olé... olé... olé... PA-TO! PA-TO!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eHkr8jSOrgQ&feature=related

Baaaa. I'm going to be a sheep on this one and go along with the crowd. I don't think Pato should be a regular starter just yet. Rotate him with the other strikers and give him time to acclimate to Serie A. He IS scary good though.

Question: Pato as a regular!

Could he and should he be a regular at his age?? What do you think?

I'm not quite sure... I think he's a bit too young to start playing every week.

Careca: Pato will be the best of the best !!


Pato played his first game against Napoli. And Carlo Ancelotti said that he was of a similar mold to Careca.

Careca: "Pato will become the best player in the history of this sport, he his very fast and physically strong, with just a glimpse on the Gkeeper he makes his decision in split seconds, and Pato has a big hunger for winning."

Ancelotti: Pato ? He's mature and calm !


And finally Pato played his first match for AC Milan, which was a success. Pato was an integral part of the team yesterday, and he was decisive in helping his team get the 3 points, his movement and skill, and above, all his goal.

Radio Rai had an interview with Carlo Ancelotti on Pato: "He is a very mature player for his age. He was able to play with extreme coldness in this game, at the same time he enjoyed the game. Pato was determined to play, after being stopped from playing for six months, he lived this reality calmly. And I gave him the piece f mind during those times, as he waited with calmness, and had time to meet his new team mates and get to know them better. But I never told him anything before the match, in my opinion he didn't need any motivation from my part. Pato has great speed, excellent movement and agility, and great speed in preparation." 

Seedorf to SKY: Pato has a great talent that which can help Milan


Clarence Seedorf, Milan'd Dutch midfielder talked to SKY about the rising star Alexandre Pato.

Seedorf said: "He has talent but he has to nurture it, and I will be the first to help him build the right atmosphere to help him do that. Ale has to grow and get better in a positive way so he can respond to Milan's needs. I hope he has a excellent professional career."

Ronaldo: Is Pato my heir ? He has to take his own road.


After a Magical night in the San Siro, the complements are not running short for the ROssoneri's new star Alexandre Pato, who scored his first goal on his debut.


Ronaldo, who was one of the reasons Pato choose Milan, talked about the game with reference to the new phenomeno: "It was very exciting to play with Pato. Is he my heir ? I don't know, he is very young but strong, he just needs to find his own route. He was a spectacle on the pitch, but he needs to find the right balance as not to find it difficult on the pitch."

Paolo Maldini: Pato needs to feel that he is a part of this team.


Payo joining Milan, might be the best thing to ever happen to him. As he is now standing in the middle of the most experienced and successful team on earth. Where he can learn from legends such as Paolo Maldini.

Il Capitano talked after the match, giving valuable pointers to Pato: "This teenager has a great personality along with skill and technical ability. There was a lot of pressure surrounding him, I don't know if he read the daily news or not, but he took the pitch with extreme calmness. From now on, he has to play on a consistent basis with the team, so that he feels he's a part of the team, and to help him develop his raw talent and nurture it as best possible. The secret is to make him feel that he is part of the group."

Gila has been great whenever he was fielded with an SS, it's a shame he's written off as soon as a new forward arrived.

Gila has been great whenever he was fielded with an SS, it's a shame he's written off as soon as a new forward arrived.

P.S. Pato signed a contract with Nike.

Gila has been great whenever he was fielded with an SS, it's a shame he's written off as soon as a new forward arrived.

Exactly.

And Gila's the only chance we've had for goals recently, who else is going to score? Ronaldo and Inzaghi?

In my opinion Gila has the same problem Sheva does, the teams expecting him to play in a system that he's less effective in.

Because there, he scored goal after goal! And now with Pato near him and KaKa behind..

I think that's what our future attack will be. R9s coming towards the end of his career and is always injured.

(P.S. Nice sig!)

A journalist in a Greek sports newspaper devoted his column to Pato's heroics against Napoli and he wrote something I had never heard or read of before: He wrote that when Pato was 10 years old, it was discovered that he had a benign tumour in his arm that could develop into cancer. His family could not afford to pay for the required surgery but thankfully a family friend and doctor payed for the medical expenses!

Everybody wants to be like Milan. Now all the clubs in all of the world want to get the new Pato.

I hate that they call themselves the red devils. It's probably my main and (only) cause for dislike. Like they're imposters or something in my book.

To be fair to United,

    Who are you and what have you done to Kurt ???

how good is Pato's italian? can he speak it at all!!?

Pato lives up to the hype

Actual football beats transfer speculation by so much it's ridiculous, so the restart of the Serie A season could not come soon enough.

Although Italians fans who subscribe to Sky Sports Italia will have had their festive fill of football with the dozen or so English Premier League matches the broadcaster aired; most of them bearing the distinctive characteristic of actual fans filling the background on all angles of camera shots.

Sadly the same thing can't be said about Italian grounds, where an early-season upward trend in attendance was followed, right after the November 11 riots following the fatal shooting of a Lazio fan by a police patrolman, by yet another decrease, although statistics are still incomplete.

That sound you heard in the background during the prolonged Christmas holidays for Serie A teams was the incessant hype machine touting the division's hottest new arrival, Brazilian budding superstar Alexandre Pato, who signed for Milan last summer but has only been eligible to play for the Rossoneri since the turn of the year.

Having spent the better part of 22 million euros to get him, Milan clung to him, or better yet the idea of him, like ivy.

In fact, it is well known that once Carlo Ancelotti's side started the season so poorly, falling way behind local rivals Inter in the title race while keeping a reasonable form in the Champions League, the official mantra was that Milan's season would not take shape or meaning until the World Championship for Clubs in mid-December.

To their credit the Rossoneri won and then bolstered their apparent resurgence by propogating stories that Pato had reportedly been doing terrific stuff in training.

While it would not be particularly helpful to know Pato's performances in midweek had raised Ancelotti's eyebrows, since the affable coach seems to wear a permanent mask of calm bewilderment( ), you have to sit up and take notice when some of the veterans in the side, among them Paolo Maldini, praise the newly arrived youngster, predicting a bright future for him.

This near Patolog... er, pathological (why didn't Pana come up with this??) anticipation of the young Brazilian's arrival on the big scene was finally dissolved on Sunday night when Pato made his debut for Milan in the home clash with Napoli.

The scene had been set: with a typical disdain for rationality and meteorological history, the match had been brought back from 3pm to 8.30pm - just what the doctor ordered for a mid-January match in cold Northern Italy - and with the rest of the Serie A program already completed, all eyes were going to be set upon Milan, Pato's debut and Ronaldo's return.

For once, the result met the anticipation, as Milan won 5-2, breaking their season-long winless streak at the San Siro in the Serie A, and Pato scored his first Italian goal with a coolly-taken strike 16 minutes from the end: running under a long pass/clearance by Massimo Ambrosini, the Brazilian trapped the ball and cut inside defender Maurizio Domizzi in one darting move, then placed the ball under advancing keeper Gennaro Iezzo, who had left the ground in anticipation of Pato lifting the ball over him.

A great piece of skill which left Pato on the brink of tears and sent headline writers, not to mention pun bandits, on a frenzy: many significant Italian words end with the four letters 'pato' and one can only wonder what will be next.

Although an impressive amount of triviality seems already to have been injected by hyperventilating newspapers in Milan's new approach to the season with the inevitable moniker for the Rossoneri's strike force, Ka-Pa-Ro (Kaka-Pato-Ronaldo), a reminiscence of the glorious Gre-No-Li (Gren-Nordahl-Liedholm) of the early Fifties.

Somehow, the new version lacks the aura and pomposity of the older one, and looks downright stupid to me. But then I do not have to influence readers. ( If you were a neutral you'd find this funny)

What Milan's win means for the future is difficult to fathom, at the moment.

Last year, the Rossoneri's run to the Champions League final and to third place in Serie A was launched during the winter break, when the squad spent a few days training in the warmer surroundings of Malta.

At the time, Milan were already out of the Serie A title race, not least because they had started the season with a eight-point penalty following their involvement in the Calciopoli scandal: their immediate goal was to climb the table upto fourth place and automatic Champions League participation, but a few weeks after the Malta camp Carlo Ancelotti was facing another test of his coaching skills when Milan announced the signing of Ronaldo from Real Madrid.

Having already played in Europe with the Spanish side, Ronaldo was at once Cup-tied but vital to Milan's season, and Ancelotti basically had to draw up two different versions of the same team, one for domestic competition, one for Europe.

Mission accomplished on both fronts, as Ronaldo's goals - seven in 14 matches - lifted the Rossoneri to fourth place, while some great Champions League nights saw Milan advance to the final and eventually beat Liverpool in Athens to lift the European Cup for the seventh time.

Given the long tradition of superstitions that has always resided in footbal, it is not difficult to see why this year's break in the sun, this time in Dubai, was also seen as the panacea for most of the troubles Milan had seen in their path during the first half of the season.

And the grand manner which the Rossoneri dispatched Napoli, overcoming their own shortcomings in midfield and defence(midfield ) with an exciting display of attacking football, may also encourage comparisons with last year.

Ancelotti will have his work cut out again, though. The 4-3-1-2 formation used on Sunday, with Pato partnering Ronaldo up front and Kakà exploiting the space behind them, means Clarence Seedorf has to revert to being a midfielder, alongside Andrea Pirlo and Ambrosini (or Rino Gattuso).

Seedorf, one of the most vocal and influential members of the team, has already, discreetly but gently expressed his displeasure at leaving what he believes - with some evidence - to be his better position, alongside Kakà in a 4-3-2-1, and only a successful run of results will keep others whose place in the side may be under threat, like Alberto Gilardino, happy.

The irony of this all?

While Ronaldo, Kakà and Pato were stretching Napoli's defence, Inter were already on their way home, having overcome the winter-break syndrome which can affect sides returning from the Christmas holidays with a comfortable lead at the top.

Their win in Siena followed a familiar pattern: once ahead, albeit on a questionable penalty, Inter let their guard down for a moment, allowing Massimo Maccarone to equalise, then shifted gears as they've so often done and coasted home, their skill and physical superiority too much for Siena to deal with.

The introduction of Pato along with Ronaldo's surprising recovery from an apparently endless stream of injuries, should result in a better second half of the season for Milan.

But ironically the onus seems to be on Inter, for some time the better side, to prove their real worth in the Serie A, by increasing their already comfortable seven-point lead over Roma, and in Europe, by outlasting their rivals and getting their hands to the trophy after an awesome 43-year hiatus.

Forgive me for the cliché, but one swallow - or duck, the English translation for Pato - does not make a summer, but it could still make a season, and an interesting one, at that.

how good is Pato's italian? can he speak it at all!!?

I still ofcourse Like Sheva more than Pato.
Pato is going to be just like Sheva. Hes going to leave just like him.
what do u expect from him? to stay his whole life here?

What are you talking about?!?!   

What are you talking about?!?!   

He's just comparing him to Sheva I think. I actually agree with him. Pato will leave at some point - and not just because he's too old or wants to finish his career back home.

Lol sorry iv been speaking to this foreign guy all day and i think my english has lowered