Our biggest problem are the background characters. B&G.

Oh, but there is. I'll post a table later comparing Allegri, Seedorf and Inzaghi in the last two years.

I think it's high time Galliani evaluated Pippo's position

Until now, we've been lead to believe that he's untouchable, but this can't go on any longer

Pippo out. That is all.

Not in this case. That's a top 3 Serie A team and this fucking idiot has it playing like a bottom 3 one.

Agree that B&G aren't exactly conducive to good things but Pippo's to blame for this crap.

We switched from a terrible coach, to a rookie and to another rookie in the space of a few months

This team is more well balanced then the one Allegri had yet Pippo is managing to do even worse than Allegri if that were possible

7 months of utter dross as we say here in Scotland. 2 wins in 12 Serie A matches.

He's both out of his depth and an outrageously poor football manager.

It was the wrong appointment, I knew it from the start. I objected to it, said he was much better served in Primavera.

He did very well there.

But once appointed I gave him my full support till recently when it began to waver, but it's gone now.

He's the worst manager in the past 4 decades. Worse than Leo, Allegri, Seedorf or even Liedholm.

Maybe people will wake up and realise the players aren't very good. Allegri's 3rd place the other year is looking more and more like a miracle.

Surely not one masterminded by his incompetence

They're better than this Kurt. We have a top 3 quality first team, certainly top 5 at worst. This is a bottom 3 level performance.

Milan under Allegri, Seedorf and Inzaghi in the last one year and a half, each of them with half a season at their disposal:

Allegri - 22 points; 5 wins, 7 draws, 7 losses
Seedorf - 35 points; 11 wins, 2 draws, 6 losses
Inzaghi - 26 points; 6 wins, 8 draws, 6 losses

Allegri was rightfully sacked because his Milan was unwatchable on top of achieving cringe-worthy results. Seedorf was sacked despite accomplishing a very good 35-point run, including 11 wins and sometimes very attractive football. Inzaghi has accomplished more or less the same as Allegri: terrible results and horrible, horrible displays.

Why was Seedorf sacked? Because a bunch of leeches and cockroaches who have the courage of calling themselves Milan senators showcased direct disapproval to Berlusconi against Seedorf. Because Seedorf was not in agreement with Galliani, as he deemed some players unfit or unworthy to be a part of this team. Some say Seedorf wasn't very warm and respectful, but rather cocky in his overall attitude. Yet, he accomplished very acceptable results during his spell with us.

Now you tell me, why shouldn't Inzaghi be sacked? Because he's a 'Yes-man'. He's Silvio and Galliani's b*tch (pardon my language). He doesn't moan, he doesn't complain. He simply accepts the status quo and doesn't move on. And this way of doing things is perfectly reflected onto his players, who show no desire and willingness to sweat and spit blood for this shirt. They are simply pedestrians on the pitch, acting as individualistic peasants rather than professionals fighting for that 3rd spot.

Overall, this club has many problems, but the management is what really brings us down. We have fallen so low, that winning is not the objective anymore. That Milan mentality has been lost for good...

Nah, I'm actually taking a macro view, because, they were the ones that appointed him. Knowing that he barely any coaching experience of professional football, and zero knowledge of how to manage a big team a top club like this. The last thing we needed these past few years was an inexperienced coach that learns on the job.

Getting back to your point, though, yeah Inzaghi is to blame for these atrocious displays, and the players too. They're just taking fans for a ride, that's all. I mean, Atalanta for heaven's sake. And look at the players we have at our disposal. But all said, Berlusconi, and in particular, Galliani should have known better than to hire Inzaghi.

There may come a day when all these character disappear from the club, and for me that day couldn't come sooner.

Exactly. We can blame the players and the coach as much as we want, but more blame should go to the ones that brought them here, in full knowledge that they were mediocre. And in the case of Inzaghi, he did not even have a history of managing a big team. The appointments of Leo, Seedorf and Allegri were the same actually.

Galliani doesn't have the gal to go hire a real, true, tested coach. A coach, not a rookie in a suit masquerading as one. Besides, Inzaghi was just a poacher, I never for one believed he had footballing intelligence, something that a midfield player for instance would have. For this reason hiring Seedorf was a chance I was willing to bet on.

But Allegri and Lenoardo, who are they but and what real knowledge of the game do they possess? It showed in their every decision, every substitution, and every lineup they fielded.

Oh, and just for the record, I believe we'd have won the league if Pablo was in charge. Pablo, as in Diego Pablo Simeone, or someone of his type that could extract the best from all available players. We haven't had a motivational coach in eons, actually. Someone that lifts the squad up by a few marks just with his actions.

who fits that mold? Mihajlovic is too principled to join an ex direct rival. what does that leave us with? Serse Cosmi? and lessn't forget that Pippo was supposed to be our motivator

Also i've read that abate called out Cerci on his lax positioning and they got into a brawl...This can be either good or terrible, though it's nice to see some players give a **** a midst these performances...

I'm going to give some ratings for the hell of it:

Lopez: 7 Stopped it being worse. Had no chance with the goal.

Abate: 7 Can hold his head high. No lack of fight and kept trying to create up front, while doing a decent job at the back.

Mexes: 6 Reasonable overall.

Rami: 5 Mediocrity at its finest.

Bonera: 5 Did as well as a natural CB can at LB.

De Jong: 6 Not bad, been better, but some good moments of play breaking.

Monto: 2 Just...terrible. After a bright period of good form on his return, he's become worse than last season's Monto now. Since Sassuolo...just diabolical. Van Ginkel deserves a chance.

Bona: 8 By miles our best player. Showed skill, fight, willingness to get forward and defend. Really good.

Menez: 2 Back to old Menez.

SES: 6 He put everything he had in, but for all the effort up front, there is just rarely end product with him. But he's played worse than this.

Cerci: 3 Horrendous. Showed no attacking flair, and rightly subbed off.

Subs:

Armero: 6 To give him his dues he had a decent match - best he's played for us.

Pazzo: 4 Back to normal Pazzo. Effort but lack of quality.

Niang: 6 tbh he showed more attacking quality in his cameo than Menez & Cerci combined.

I don't actually blame any individual vfor the goal - it was just an all round poorly organised Milan conceding again. Oddly enough I noticed De Jong peg the danger but knew he couldn't get there in time. Pity he hadn't tracked the runner.

Pippo: 0 His time is up. Can't manage, can't motivate, hasn't the first clue about tactics, or altering a system, and consistently rotates the team no matter who is playing about how they're doing.

He needs to go.

Abate is one of the most honourable players we have. He cares.

But not sure why Cerci is being blamed for bad positioning. In what sense? Attack? Defence?

PS the Cerci Abate spat has been more or less confirmed.

As I said in my previous post, he's the embodiment of this Milan. Mediocre player. I was closely observing him, whenever we had the ball in midfield, he was just lazily walking instead of freeing himself to receive the pass. This is something most of our players do, and one of our main issues that need to be addressed, but Montolivo is the captain. He's supposed to be the leader and brains of our midfield. To expect such behavior from him is unacceptable. He's a very small player, and to have him tarnish the legendary Milan armband perfectly demonstrates how low we have fallen.

Just re-watched the goal. It's clearly De Jong's fault for leaving Denis run into the box. Mexes also should have been more aware at the moment of the pass.

Can't disagree on current form. But I will say that without the captaincy he was MUCH better in 2012/2013. The guy just never was captain material, and I'm even wondering how he got it at Fiorentina as there isn't a leading bone in his body.

Like I said in my post, De Jong at least did track back but pegged the danger too late - where was Monto? Half way line doing absolutely nothing.

And the goal itself was a collaboration of about 5 or 6 failings in truth - all defensive. But the gap between Mexes and Bonera was just comical.

I think in this case it's easy to place blame on an individual, or even multiple ones, but the problem is that Menez lost possession when we were pressing forward. So most players were caught off guard, as soon as the ball was turned over by Menez who back healed it to an opponent, the players tried to get back but because they were all seemingly in "relaxed" mode because we were in possession and had it not been for Menez's showboating we would have kept that possession they were caught off guard

I'm not saying it's right that they were in that relaxed mode, but the goal came about because of Menez's mistake. When you lose the ball in that area of the pitch you're always at risk.

And we tend to do this a lot. Muntari, Essien, Poli have all been major culprits in this. They're spaced out and send the ball to no one in the most dangerous areas. And usually for some reason we get out of jail, but at some point you're bound to get punished for it. And it's not just those 3. There's an air of indifference, lack of concentration, just being plain old spaced out at times from all our players

Most chances that our opponents create come about because of mistakes on the part of our own players, mistakes that at this level should not be made

Don't forget your golden boy, Montolivo. Plenty of wrong passing and "creating". Other then that, spot on.

Han has a curious inability to aportion any blame to Monto or Mexes. I will whine about my favourites when they f*ck up (Cerci was an abomination and I gave Zapata pelters for the Coppa match) but Han struggles to.

And it's not an attack on you Han, just an observation.

Yeah, Monto has been bad in these last 3 games, no question. He made a bad pass that could have cost us as well but it wasn't punished.

Monto came back from injury and looked great, we return from the break and it's like he's a completely different player, that being said, the entire squad has returned from the break in terrible form and with an even worse attitude

Monto has been mostly pedestrian imo. He's not committing mistakes that catch the eye. He's just not influential. The games he played before the break there was a clear difference in how he improved our play, now he's just inconsequential to it.

@ Danny, I'm not reluctant to say anything about my favourites.

That being said, Mexes was one of the few good ones yesterday, so I don't get what point you're trying to make with him

However, as you can see I've been reluctant to place blame on any single individual, even the ones I'm not particularly a fan of (Cerci).

The problem lies so far away from individuals that atm I feel it's pointless to even mention each player one at a time. All of them are under performing, all of them are showing a lack of commitment atm, not just one or two players.

At this point my only point is Pippo, he needs to be let go, this is just not acceptable, it's just as unacceptable as Allegri was imo, and dragging this out like we did with Allegri will only continue to hurt this team even more

Agreed again. But say, when did Monto look great? I think it's partly a myth, he had made one or two good matches. Was he MoM? Did he do anything concrete to be great?



Sorry, his mistakes caught my eye. His absolutely stunningly poor goal shooting, his imprecise passing and on top of it his dangerous give-aways. And I would buy that "he's come from an injury" excuse the moment you mentioned it, if only I did not know that "inconsequential" and "inconsistently average" has Monto written all over it, from day one at Milan.

I think the last 3 matches we played before the break Monto did look very good and he improved our play. He's not an assist man, but when he's doing his job right he helps to ensure the ball keeps moving and he controls tempo better than anyone we have.

I think those games vs these last 3 show a very clear slump in how he's playing, a complete nose dive in form and when he's playing like this, yes I agree, he becomes inconsequential to our game and doesn't add anything to it. However I disagree that this has been the case from day one. He had a very good first season with us. Last season was average at best and this season he's spent half of it out injured.

I get that you say that the injury is an "excuse" but you have to factor in that he is returning from a very serious leg fracture that required knee surgery to correct. Most players take an entire year to recover from that and start playing with any sort of consistency. Most never really return back to their old selves. Think David Villa, Wilshire, etc. I know people simply cannot accept this as an excuse because we're in a position were we can't afford to have him not playing well, we don't really have a back up so his failings are magnified even more.

My point re: Mexes is you never criticise his bad performances, instead spinning it that he was great/good. He can do no wrong in your eyes beyond being 'occasionally hotheaded'. At least you admit Monto's a travesty. So 1 out of 2 ain't bad and I'll take it.

Point me to one single bad game this season and you'll have the 2 out of 2. The only iffy performance he's had was last week against Toro, but he was far from bad, just not on his usual game, and as you may probably remember I certainly didn't say he was good/great in that one

See? When he's bad you spin it as 'iffy'.

No offense, but that's horseshit. Keeps the ball moving? Controls the tempo? He does no such things. He's a useless dud, as useless as Muntari. He's never been anything impressive with this shirt. Only one decent season doesn't make you a good, reliable player. At best he can be a DM that breaks play and makes the simple pass, but even at that I wouldn't put much faith him. The fact that he's considered the "playmaker" of our team makes me shudder in disgust.

Very good first seasons? How tangible is that? What did he exactly make to be very good? I still think you've gotta do assists and goals to be very good in this game for a season, even a deep midfielder. You have some rare exemptions like Effenberg or Pirlo, but first, you look at their stats and you still see their contribution and secondly they add much more then just "tempo" and "moving the ball around". You like Montolivo, and out of all our midfielders, he may be the most talented one. But it's not enough. In fact, looking back, I hardly can find any past or present player like Montolivo, who sort of is our key midfielder but does not contribute with key stats. Can you name me one such (good) player?

Look at our midfield. You have Montolivo and NDJ who are practically vaccinated from being dangerous for the opposition. You can easily let Monto shoot around or cross the ball, because he rarely hits the target. Same for NDJ. You know how problematic this is? Players like Davids and Gattuso used to make up for this problem with giving their ins and outs, playing like pitbulls. Do you see this in Monto? Well, only when we play Barcelona.



But no, I get the whole injured thing. But problem is: Montolivo is back and I honestly think this is his old self, a recuperated Montolivo. I don't think it has anything to do with the injury. This was his problem all the way, he never once showed 3 good performances in a row, never actually worked his *** off or made some tangible contributions.


No man, Muntari is on another level. But yes, you got it right, playmaker my ***. Just think of Boban, Albertini, Rui Costa and Pirlo. Now put in Montolivo and you can instantly shoot yourself.

tbh Monto isn't like any of them Pippo. He has never been portrayed as a DLP, or a borderline treq, even if he's been played as both occasionally.

What he is is a dreadfully poor man's Gerrard. That kind of supposed 'pulling the strings' general in midfield, calming things, leading midfield, playing the right pass.

He's supposed to be that but he's not even doing that now.

This is mind-blowing. There were reports yesterday claiming Berlusconi was furious after Sunday's defeat, saying "I understand the times when we used to win against Barcelona are gone, but it's unacceptable to lose against teams who have 5x lower budgets than ours". Then, today, he denied having said such things, and that he's close to the team and Inzaghi.

Source: Mediaset

WTF?! So, it's OK to lose against Sassuolo and Atalanta at home? I'm really pissed at this management for the way they take things nowadays. Yes, we're not the big Milan anymore blah blah blah, but there's a vast difference between winning the Serie A and the Champions, and being 8th in a crappy league by playing some atrocious football. We cannot be this bad! Where's the reaction? Even from the fans, there's no backlash, no reaction to this status quo that's bringing us down year by year. It's like we've accepted that we're a mid-table team. Gah!!!

Well every team has it's ups and downs. I think there will be some years, hopefully not decades till (if) we get where we were. If you take a look at football history every team has had some bad years. The important thing is that we get back.

Things will definitely take a turn after Silvio kicks the bucket. Whether they will take a turn for the good or for the bad, that's unknown. Some teams have had downs and have not been able to recover since.

Well, it's the same old tune for quite some time. Remember the days when we were sure (or almost sure) that Galliani was gone and that Barbara would step in? Soon this has been reduced to a co-habitation between the two, and now back to Galliani.

The club is simply unable to make changes or decisive moves, because so many people have their hands in it deep and their egos do not allow any fairness.

Yup. We should be challenging for 3rd place, even with our reduced budget. Pippo has been a huge disappointment, but he is not at the root of the problem. Looks to me like we are doomed to mediocrity with B&G. Anyone still believe we have a "project" or a "grand plan"?

As much as Bertie and Gimrod have a part to play, we DO have a decent squad and Pippo has reduced it to a pile of shite.

95% of the blame for the woeful results this season is Pippo.

That's why we were blaming Allegri in the first place, wasn't it? Maybe we overestimate our players a bit, but even so, 26 points in 19 games is too little. The 3rd place is theoretically impossible because Juve, Roma and Napoli are better than us, but 4th and 5th place are totally within our reach, yet we are massively under-performing. Not to mention the ugly-@ss football we play. At least with Allegri in 12/13 we played like crap but still managed to get that 3rd spot (with a bit of luck and help from referees, that is).

If I were to describe Pippo's Milan in one word, it would be 'life-less'.

The day X off gives any kind of 'support' to Allegri is the day the earth stops spinning.

That day has happened.

Well, at the beginning of the season some of us here said 3rd place should be reachable. Now we are 4th or 5th place chasers - but this is still a very much reachable goal, don't you think?

Allegri managed to get us 3rd but he had a better squad. I don't know what you guys expect, we have a toothless attack with a washed out Pazzini, Torres (now gone) and the never in-form SES. Much goes on Pippo and his insisting in the stupid wingers plus false 9 system, agreed.

But Allegri had matchwinners like Ibrahimović and Balotelli in his squad. Every 3rd or 4th match we played they would pull out a stunner and win games like Atalanta, Bologna, Siena, etc. by themselves.

One other thing is, both Seedorf and Inzaghi couldn't shake off the mentality Allegri and our management inflicted to the team. Seedorf was getting closer to the task, while Inzaghi seemingly goes along the stream and tries to build around such a small minded mentality.

Thing is, by sacking Inzaghi we won't achieve anything unless the management changes their approach. If Inzaghi goes, in comes - say Gattuso, Ambrosini or anyone who's prepared to take over and listen to Galliani and Berlu without much resistance.

Said it straight. Well put, and that's what most of us having been saying for a while now.

Really?



It's really not that different, and it doesn't have the likes of Bona, Alex, Lopez, Menez, Cerci, and Suso.

Indeed the best team there is arguably: Abbiati, Abate, Mexes, Zapata, MDS, De Jong, Flamini, Monto, Boateng, Balo & SES. And by the time he left (end of that season IIRC), Boateng was absolutely horrendous for us.

The one thing Allegri had was Balo during the peak of his career - January 2013 - summer that year. But for Balo those 6 months read Menez today.

I wouldn't say our current squad is any weaker. I'd say it's actually stronger. Two decent keepers, a glut of (in theory) decent CBs like Rami, Mexes, Alex, Zapata, a whole host of midfielders like Monto, De Jong, Van Ginkel, Jack, Essien, Muntari, and attackers like SES, Menez, Cerci, Pazzo etc.

I don't believe Allegri's squad was better at all. Same at best, weaker at worst.

I agree that our squad is a little better than it was the last couple of years, at least on paper. With this squad, and with the current state of other Serie A teams, 3rd place should have been achievable this year. I agree that most of the blame for our pathetic results goes to Pippo. However, Pippo was selected by Galliani with Berlu's approval.

Pippo fits Galliani's objectives because he is unlikely to challenge the leadership or press for changes or heavy investments. Not sure why Berlu still goes along with Galliani (could be that it is too expensive to sack him, or maybe Berlu is just operating under some delusions of grandeur, or whatever). The point is that this situation dooms us to mediocrity, and I see no burning desire on B&G's part to change anything. (Beyond empty words.) And IMHO anyone that still believes present management has any "vision" or is doing anything more than fumbling around is smoking something bad.

Balotelli was the difference maker, while SES and Pazzo were in-form strikers. Agreed, much upon the striker form falls on Pippo's sholders, but I'd still have Balo in our team any day over Menez.