I did not deny that it factored into the good performances.

But, and it's a big but. You cannot deny the football or the fitness level which have improved exponentially. I don't think this has anything to do with the stadium being empty, and more to do with the work the players and Pioli are putting in.

We haven't looked this physically fit or cohesive in years. We're outrunning teams in pretty much all the games we've played and considering the schedule, this was not an easy task.

It's easy to attribute this all to having no pressure but I just don't think that's entirely true. This just feels different to when we went on good runs under Rino or Montella or any of the other coaches we've had in recent years.

Obviously we could be wrong and we could bottle it in the first game of next season. But I don't think that will be the case.

I did not deny that it factored into the good performances.

But, and it's a big but. You cannot deny the football or the fitness levels which have improved exponentially. I don't think this has anything to do with the stadium being empty, and more to do with the work the players and Pioli are putting in.

We haven't looked this physically fit or cohesive in years. We're outrunning teams in pretty much all the games we've played and considering the schedule, this was not an easy task.

It's easy to attribute this all to having no pressure but I just don't think that's entirely true. This just feels different to when we went on good runs under Rino or Montella or any of the other coaches we've had in recent years.

Obviously I could be wrong and we could bottle it in the first game of next season. But I don't think that will be the case.

Hopefully you're right Han, all I can say

I hope so too

Is there an ounce of Milan left in Pirlo?

He seems to have just airbrushed us out of his entire career and is doing everything he can to violate the memories.

No matter what he says, he knows his most prestigious trophies came during his time at Milan.

He's salty about the fact that Galliani did not want to give him more than a year renewal (has a point) and the fact that while at Milan he was never the biggest star on the team, he was always outshone by others during his time with us.

I honestly don't care. We're the ones who let him go, depriving ourselves of one of the biggest talents in Italian football ever, for free nonetheless! Juve welcomed him, treated him with respect, gave him the U23 and now the first team jobs. Was he just supposed to tell them to f*ck off?

He's doing the right thing for his career, but the chances of him being burnt right away are very high. Juventus is a very unstable environment right now, and not everyone can become like Zidane.

True, one of the worst mistakes made by Galliani among a whole lot of other mistakes

But you can't deny that Pirlo has been a little b!tch about Milan. His book especially was one huge whine fest

I don't remember, what did he say?

Funny thing is his form was pretty rotten by the time we let him go, which, yes, was a mistake, but then he goes to Juve and probably hits his career best form and becomes an intergalactic hero.

And yes, he was horrible about us, very petty, and it does sometimes feel like his post-Milan career was to spite us.

Pirlo was hardly rotten for us. Perhaps he was not shining as her did in the mid 00s, but I mean the 2008-2011 Milan was hardly a great side to be in. Everyone was underperforming. His last season with us (2010/11) he got an injury that kept him out for months. When he got back Allegri had already chosen van Bommel as his replacement, which pretty much pushed him out.

Funnily enough van Bommel would leave after one year, and Allegri would move to Juve where he would find Pirlo again and this time he had to shut his trap and accept Pirlo's brilliance.

I don't deny all of this, but his form was poor in those last 3 or 4 years, however you try to word it.

Can't strictly make the excuse that it was a rubbish team, because class always shines through. Look how Ibra has single handedly dragged Milan up?

It really depends on the type of player we're talking about. Players like Ibra, Kaka, Ronaldo etc. are individual players who carry their teams and make things happen on their own.

Pirlo was a player who relied on the collective for his qualities to shine through. He was a deep-lying playmaker after all, the man furthest away from attack. And I repeat, his last few years with us were good. Not excellent, but not terrible either.

You're just making excuses now! His last few years were mediocre at best. Good players will always look like good players no matter what team they're in or what position. Thing is, even if I was to buy your reasoning, we won the league in 2011!

Funny thing is he only played half of that season and hey presto, we played well enough without him to win the league!

I agree with Danny on this one. Pirlo's last few years were abysmal at best, and I remember us here on this very forum making excuses for him and talking about his position and whether he should be moved, and what the reasons were for his under-performing. When in actuality it was him that was the issue. Pirlo was THE star at Juve, which imo is why I think he looks back on his time there more fondly than he does at Milan, even if we were the club who gave him his identity and where he won the biggest honours of his career, including the World Cup

Pirlo was an ungrateful SoB. And he had the audacity to write in his book that he would have walked to Madrid in 06 but that his consolation was the CL win the following season. As if he was the catalyst for that win and not the big star of the Club during that time, which was Kaka and not him

He was always outshone during his time with us. Sheva, Kaka, Rui, Seedorf, Paolo, all had bigger personas and got the attention while Pirlo was playing for us, which imo is part of the reason he values his time at Juve more.

Having said all of that. No matter how he was playing for us, it was a fatal error that we let him leave for free. The fact that he went to Juve and kick started their era of dominance makes it even more egregious.

Yep, agreed.