I was mainly referring to this period when he's unavailable plus next year when he'll definitely leave, but even so I still don't like the way he takes penalties.

Well, next year we'll have a new attacker (hopefully not Belotti) who will take these I suppose. I don't trust Theo in that way.

I just don't like the way he takes them. But most of all I don't want him stat-padding off of us anymore either. He shouldn't be rewarded anymore. He's about the spit in the face of this club after all the patience, time and money they invested in him. I disagree with him being given the armband and being allowed to take pens. I also don't think he should be taking minutes away from Bennacer and Tonali at this point either


Theo is probably our best striker of the ball. He'd be an excellent taker imo

Happy new year guys! ��

We seem to have regained something we lost during December. Watching the game here at 6:30 am. Forza Milan!

Is Theo the captain?

Brahim is absent.

Totally, and Alexis is very bad and useless. Bring on Messias in the second.

Agreed.

THEOOOO

Beautiful pass by Leao.

Man, this team is lacking few players in key positions. I wish we could reinforce the team in January...

And here is our new penalty taker..Theo.

That's how you take a penalty. No keeper could ever save it.

Anyway, another good win. Venezia IMO are not a pushover, and they were always a constant threat until the 3rd goal. That and the red card closed the match.

A few pointers:

- Kalulu was impressive. For such a young player his defending today was world class. He's growing exponentially.

- Florenzi is turning to be a great signing. His contribution on the right is increasing match after match, and I think he's reached a level where the choice between him and Calabria doesn't really make a difference anymore. I'd argue he's even better than Calabria in certain aspects.

- Finally a good game by Bakayoko. Only a slight mistake in the second half, but overall an imposing performance with many balls won and presence in the center.

- Tonali got booked and will miss Spezia at home next week. IMO he did it on purpose (we were winning 3-0), because we're facing Juventus afterwards and he didn't want to risk it. Kind of questionable since we don't have neither Bennacer nor Kessie, but I guess Bakayoko-Krunic will do against Spezia.

- Messias brings on a completely new level of quality compared to Alexis. Not saying he's incredible or anything, but overall his intelligence, vision, passing and movements are far superior.

- Brahim absent again. This was a relatively easy game where he should have thrived yet he didn't do anything worth noting. I'm starting to miss Capanoglu...

- Good to see Rebic back but his decision-making is terrible. So, so many misplaced passes. There was one counterattack where we were 3v2 and he gave away the ball in the mostg amateurish way possible.

Let's now hope Lazio get a draw against Inter, and that we also hopefully recover Tomori and/or Romagnoli from Covid ASAP.

Hopefully both Romag and Tomori got the lighter omicron variant.

Diaz I won't comment. He has talent but that's just about it. Will be a cornerstone player for Malaga someday...

And I don't think Tonali did that on purpose. It was sort of a reflex, something you never should doubt doing/or do you mechanically.

But I agree re Florenzi (exactly what I feel with him) and Kalulu.

I'd only get a CB and AM in January if it were up to me.

We have too many bodies in certain positions while lacking in others

The CB is needed ASAP. I don't understand why we're insisting on Botman at this point when Lille are rejecting 40m bids from Newcastle. We can never match that

As for the attacking mid. I think Diaz's problem is completely mental. He lost a step after covid and he seems to have lost confidence as a result. We need to bring someone in to take the pressure off of him at this point. Plus going into the season with only one attacking mid was always mental since that's the fulcrum of our system


I don't know if Tonali's was intentional. But I'm more worried about Theo as he's in the same boat. I'm 99% sure he's miss either the Juve or Inter game...

If I had to choose I'd sacrifice him against Juve, but we don't have a LB available to take over. Maybe we could call up Kerkez from the Primavera against Spezia. That kid looks good

I really hope we can manage to offload Samu so we can get someone in to rotate with Diaz. He simply hasn't been able to get back that spark since Covid

Agreed re Florenzi. He's been steadily improving since coming back from injury.

Juve look awful here. Don't know if anyone is watching but this gives me hope that we can win against them even with all the players we have out

Roma are the biggest bottlers

Sorry, I disagree with you re Diaz. It's not just mental. His touch is so poor. His shooting is mostly completely off the mark, his final pass imprecise or not executed with precision. He's a lightweight player which makes way too many deficiencies compared to the technical aspect that is mostly inadequate. No man, he's just that kind of a player. Real and City didn't want him for a reason...

Disagree with that as he has shown his quality at the end of last season going into this season.

He obviously came back after covid in bad shape and that effected his confidence as well. As before that he was scoring and assisting quite regularly

He's still only just 21/22(?) years old. He has lot of time to improve. Teams like City and Real rarely keep players who are not already at their peak. The only player I can think of where Real have really been patient was Vinicius. But they spent a lot on him. And now he's finally coming good for them. After 3 years

Roma...

Btw Fillipo, all this is my general opinion on Brahim, it's not me defending his current performances.

I'm not disagreeing that as of right now he's just not cutting it. AM would be a priority position for the winter market, as much as CB. But the management don't think it is as they've made clear we're only getting a CB

Well, to be honest Han, it's not like he was this phenomenal AM before he got Covid. He was just having some good performances, that's it. And IMO his best performance this season has been against Atletico in the return leg, which was after Covid.

I think we all overhyped him a little, maybe because we didn't want to accept Capanoglu joining Inter.

I'm not saying he was the 2nd coming of Messi before Covid. But he did make a leap compared to last season imo and he was very important, especially when we were playing so well at the start of the season. He's part of the reason for that.

So I don't agree that it was just a distorted perception because we lost Hakan. Who, lest we not forget. Wasn't some great shake last season either. He was horrible after coming back from Covid as well and there was a moment when the Inter fans were starting to turn on him as well before he scored that made up pen against us

What should have happened this summer is we should have replaced Hakan with a more competent AM and used Diaz as we did last season. Relying solely on him was a mistake imo

We signed Messias who can play both AM and RW. It was a low-cost solution because we're a low-cost club, there's no other way getting around it. Signing someone better than Capanoglu means spending something close to +30M and we just can't afford it.

We'll have to make do with Brahim this season, then next season we'll have Adli for more versatility. I don't think we'll sign another top AM.

Tomori returned negative today.

Good news.

I don't think we'll sign anyone either. But I think the AM position is just as important as the CB position at this point

As for CB. I really hope we can go for Bremer. He's been insanely good so far this season. And if we don't go for him. Juve or Inter will take him. Or maybe Conte.

This management has proven that if they think the player is worth it, they'll make the investment. Even if it's steep. Leao, Tomori and Tonali are proof of this.

Bremer and Julian Alvarez would be two players that fit into that bracket. For the AM position I really don't know who we could sign at this point but it's also just as important to look into a more stable solution


Finally some good news. Hoping Alessio and Calabria will soon be able to rejoin the team as well.


With this Tomori news, I think we should sit Theo down against Spezia. We need to make sure he's available for Juve and Inter. Although it still leaves the possibility of him getting the yellow against Juve. And I really have no faith that he'll avoid it. He's a magnet for stupid yellows

No point in sitting Theo against Spezia cos as you said he can get the yellow at any time. I'd rather he misses Juve than Inter if I had to choose.

By the way, we're playing Genoa on Thursday for the Coppa if anyone wasn't aware.

As for Bremer, I heard he had a great match against Fiorentina last night (4-0 Toro win). He completely annulled Vlahovic, apparently. But Torino will never sell him in January, so we'll have to get in for next season.

I think if the offer is right Toro would sell

Plus we have Gabbia and Pobega. We can use either to sweeten the deal (Obviously putting a buy-back on both). I don't understand why we're sending Gabbia to Samp when he would be more useful in such a deal.

I agree re Theo, but my optimistic self is still hoping to have him available for both ties. Even though I'm 99% sure that is not possible with the way he gets carded

Gabbia is going to Samp? You mean Conti.

Either way, you oversimply these matters too much. It's not like we have excess players and we just hand them over to Torino in the Bremer deal. First of all you have to consider whether Torino want them in the first place, and secondly Torino might only accept cash. Also consider that Inter are strongly interested in Bremer so negotiations suddenly become an auction with the highest bidder getting the prize. You see, there are many factors that influence the purchase of a player, and all conditions must be right for us to sign that said player. It's not easy.

Anyway, I hear Pobega is out of the question because we want to keep him.

Ah, looks like it is Gabbia after all. But we need to sign a CB first.

Bailly's name being heavily linked with us today. IMO it would be a stuipd, stupid signing. Just check his injury history. In 5 years at ManU he's missed 109 games due to injuries. 109!

It's not over simplifying. This is how most clubs work. It's just us that turn a simple transfer for a player worth 20m into an endless summer transfer saga and end up with nothing in the end.

If you want to sign good players in today's market you have to be aggressive and smart. Use players like Gabbia, Pobega, Samu, etc to make deals look better to these teams. Torino love Pobega. We can give him up in the deal with a buy-back. That is how most clubs who are smart do business. Moratta at Inter will do the same if they really want him.

And the money Toro want for him is not astronomical. We have a good relationship with them as well. So if we go in with a good offer and not something that would outright offend them as we usually do, Bremer is far more achievable than Botman for example.

Also this Pellegri news Di Marzio posted yesterday about us buying him and sending him to Toro on loan could be another indication that we're buttering them up


Bailly is decent and for a 3rd choice he's be good, especially if it's just a loan move. I know he's injury prone, but the more I think about it, the more I'm against spending all the budget on just the CB. As Fillipo said a few days ago, we should get a filler CB until the end of the season, when the market is more amiable in the summer we should invest in someone long-term. Use the money now to try to bring in an AM

F*ck, we just lost Tomori. Hope it's nothing serious.

Why id we play him again? Just returning from Covid FFS, and now this!

And losing to this Genoa side as well to add insult to injury

Wtf am I watchng right now?

Messias, Krunic, Maldini, Theo, Rebic

Utter shitshow

Bad touches, bad passes, terrible attitude. Feels like no one wants to be there....

I honestly don't care whether we go through or not, I just hope it's nothing serious for Tomori. We cannot afford to lose him at this point.

Going out to this Genoa would be embarrassing


They need to wake up in the 2nd half. This is not an acceptable performance. I've seen Sunday league games with more quality ffs!

Maldini doesn't deserve to start for us. I'm sorry Paolo, but he's trash. Loan him to some Serie B side.

But everyone has been utter garbage thus far. They have no idea what they're doing.

Finally!!

Now don't let it go to ET

Actually he showed much smarter movement in the few minutes he played in the 2nd half

I'm more p!ssed off about players like Messias tbh. So selfish at times.

Rebic still looks off. Theo is having one of those days

Saelemaekers is so, so, so bad.

Who isn't today

This is the messiest display I've seen in years. Not just bad, but messy. So many bad passes

We came out here expecting a walkover, we got it from Genoa performance wise. Only we didn't account for us being worse than them

F@CK!! ET

Yeah, but Alexis is consistenly bad.

Leao is basically a cheat code at this point

Actually I disagree with that

He's either good or terrible. No in between with him as of late

He's had some really good games this season and some really bad ones.

Last season he was far more consistent

Florenzi, Gabbia and Kalulu with the only good performances of the day imo (of those who started)

Kalulu has been impeccable.