Diego Lopez; Bonera, Rami, Mexes, Armero; Montolivo, De Jong, Muntari; Bonaventura, Menez, El Shaarawy

It just gets worse.

my, my, my, my, my...

To see Bonera once again in that line-up just says it all

Not even going to get into the Muntari thing, at least if it was Essien it would have been more deserved considering he's played well in his last 2 appearances.

This is obviously Pippo taking the more "conservative" route, as he's done in every game against teams in the top half of the table

Bonera could masturbate on the centre circle over a picture of Pippo's mum while shitting on a photo of his dad and Pippo would still pick him.

Ah, good, Muntari back.

F*ck off Pippo. There's a good boy.

I lol'd loudly at this

I simply cannot understand Pippo anymore. His obsession with the same formation and tactics, when clearly nothing is working, and his unwillingness to drop players who have proved over and over that they're just terrible is becoming obnoxious.

Zapata has been bad in only game this season, Bonera has been crap in almost every game, so why play the latter? Why insist with a dud like Muntari when you have the way more reliable MvG, Poli and Bonaventura in midfield? Why keep going with 4-3-3 when we have no proper wingers? The fact our players are average is one thing, Pippo's stubbornness and complete lack of ideas is another. Oh well...

Also, what's going on with Abate? He has been absent for over a month now.

Rock bottom is when Torres gets recalled.

Here are the 22 players called up to the Milan squad for the match against Napoli: Abbiati, Agazzi, Diego Lopez, Albertazzi, Armero, Bonera, Mexes, Rami, Zaccardo, Zapata, Essien, De Jong, Montolivo, Muntari, Poli, Saponara, Bonaventura, El Shaarawy, Honda, Menez, Pazzini, Torres.

source: acmilan.com

I REALLY REALLY hope we play like this:

------------------Lopez
--Zapata - Mexes - Rami - Armero
-----------------De Jong
------------Montolivo - Poli
---------------Honda
--------------------------El Shaarawy
-------------------Pazzini

At this point Pazzo wouldn't be able to score if the net was wide open with no one to throw him off.

If we were going to go back to a 2 striker system I'd rather give Torres a proper chance

Why ? Playing him as target man wouldn't be so bad in my opinion. From what I've seen he didn't play much, or to say at all this season, but eitherway he's not the type of striker you need to cover lots of area.

He's just completely lost form and confidence, not to mention that as a player he's always been a limited poacher, it would be like playing with a man down

Pazzini is crap nowadays. As Han said, he wouldn't be able to score if the net was wide open.

You think he's crap, or you know he's crap from seeing him crap too many times this season ? Just 'cos someone is not playing we can't suggest he will fail. If he plays and then fail, we can say he's bad nowdays. But you can't say he's awful nowdays, if you haven't seen him play nowdays. It's not right.

According to GdS Milan will play with: Diego Lopez, Bonera, Rami, Mexes, Armero, Montolivo, De Jong, Poli, Honda, Menez, Bonaventura.

Another match, more change.

Pippo simply doesn't have a clue what he's doing. He's messing around, changing the team, and ultimately, as we say here in Scotland, putting square pegs in round holes.

In 5 months as coach he's started the same team 0 matches in a row.

I'm not judging him on his absence from playing, I'm judging him from those times he's played in the last couple of years. Ever since he got off that injury he's been sluggish and indecent. He wastes too many chances. He's simply not the striker he used to be. No disrespect here, but you said you haven't followed Milan for a while, so I really don't think you know Pazzini well enough these days. He's just not good, man.



I would be more than fine with that (Bonera aside) if Pippo played Honda and Bona behind Menez (Christmas tree). However, we all know they're going to be completely wasted on the wings, Menez will do the f*ck it pleases him and our midfield will remain detached from attack. That's how it goes.

I can't watch the game cos I have my flight back home in a few hours, but I can't see us winning this one. X2.

+1

Milan: Diego Lopez; Bonera, Mexes, Rami, Armero; Poli, De Jong, Montolivo; Honda, Menez, Bonaventura

Milan bench: Abbiati, Agazzi, Albertazzi, Zaccardo, C Zapata, Essien, Muntari, Saponara, El Shaarawy, Pazzini

Napoli: Rafael; Mesto, R.Albiol, Koulibaly, Ghoulam; David Lopez, Jorginho; Callejon, De Guzman, Mertens; Higuain

Napoli bench: Andujar, Colombo, Britos, Henrique, Inler, Gargano, Hamsik, Duvan Zapata

I hope the attack takes shape as a xmas tree, but something tells me both Bona and Honda will be very wide

MENEZ!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Menez!!!!!

Nice play on the goal

Decent first half although we were barely holding on by the end

This no striker system though is just not really working, it's very obvious that we do not have any outlet up there that the mids can play off of

Agreed.

This has been a problem for us for the longest while (not even just this season)

No proper transition or cohesion between the midfield & the attack.

Well, it's firstly the system and secondly our strikers are bad/out of form.

I think if we take off Honda and just stick SES up top as a striker we'd probably do a bit better in attack

Honda is really absent and Menez is just too mobile so he can't be used as a point of reference for the mids

Sh!t Muntari warming up, and I thought our midfield was doing relatively well so far

But SES will never play the central striker role. That ain't gonna happen.

I really do wish he was given a chance there, he's just not a winger imo and to continue to force him into that position will just make him regress further

Damn it!

And to think I was saying to myself at HT how much better the MF looks without the fool.

Which speaks leaps and bounds bcuz we were still far from spectacular (...but still much better).

I've noticed in the last 3 games that Bonera just cannot play 90 minutes anymore, he's usually half decent in the first half at RB, but in the 2nd he's just a ghost and everyone is running past him.

When's Abate gonna be back??

BONAVENTURAAAAAAAAAAAA

JACK!!!

YES YES YES!

Rami and Mexes have been great

Poli... Should have done a lot better there

Yup, one too many touches there. He was to shoot sooner!

Promising 2nd half thus far though.

WOW, Menez!

More like a really bad first touch that took it away from him

Wow, great skills from Menez!

Everything but the finish there from Menez.

SES should be introduced sooner rather than later.

Sh!t! Rami down!

Really worried about Zapata! He is exactly what Napoli needs right now.
Created a dangerous play from his first touch.

Pretty good...

Napoli weren't that great either so they made it easier.

Roma is the real test next week. But I definitely want to see the same midfield we saw today

Decent enough game. 3 points most importantly.

I can live with this. Forza Milan!


Next weekend's game against Roma is gonna be a tough one!!!

Agreed!

+1

Yes, FT! Important win.

Good. A working victory. And everything would be fine, but well...

To me this is a true working win. We should be able but build on this result and performance, try to elevate and use it as a focal/turning point. The problem is, I fear this kind of performance is our maximum with this team, system and coach. I'm really not seeing much space for further improvement under these conditions.

I understand exactly where you're coming from.

We need to show more determination & hunger in all our games.