Following two consecutive wins in the league, Milan headed to Bergamo with the aim of making it three. However, after conceding three goals, it all fell apart for Stefano Pioli’s men and Atalanta deservedly won.
The game was fairly even at the start with Atalanta playing a tad more direct than Milan, who dominated possession. This resulted in the home side opening the scoresheet in the 38th minute after a wicked deflection by Fikayo Tomori.
Fortunately for the Rossoneri, Olivier Giroud scored just before half-time to make it 1-1 and this was a necessary push. Milan failed to build on it in the second half, though, as Ademola Lookman stepped up again for Atalanta and made the most of sloppy defending in the 55th minute.
After the second goal, Pioli’s men had a hard time creating chances but did find a way back again through Luka Jovic in the 80th minute. However, in injury time, Davide Calabria was sent off and that led to Atalanta’s winner through Luis Muriel. Below are five takeaways from the game.
1. Disappointing by the captain
Calabria picked up a sloppy second yellow card in the dying minutes of the game, which resulted in his team losing the momentum and eventually conceding the winner. He will also not be available against Monza next week, which is far from ideal given the injury situation.
Although the third goal was down to poor defending, the fact that Milan was a man down changed the dynamic completely. You really should know better in that sense, especially when you are wearing the captain’s armband.
2. Consistently bad
After the Frosinone clash, we discussed Samuel Chukwueze’s struggles to find consistency after a positive performance against Dortmund. And that was once again evident against Atalanta.
You could argue that he technically has found consistency, but a negative one rather than a positive one. It’s becoming a real problem for Milan and has been very clear during Rafael Leao’s absence, with Christian Pulisic playing on the left instead.
Chukwueze had a couple of good moments early on against Atalanta and then disappeared from the pitch.
3. Shaky by the centre-back duo
While it was always going to be hard for Milan, playing with Theo Hernandez as a centre-back, the expectation was at least that Tomori would lead the way.
Against Atalanta, however, it was really obvious that Hernandez was played out of position and Tomori wasn’t much better either. Given the Englishman’s form in the last few months, it was a bit disappointing even if he didn’t get much help.
The three goals conceded were collective defensive mistakes and on the first two especially, Hernandez and Tomori were badly positioned and did poorly. Those mistakes must be addressed before the crucial Champions League game against Newcastle.
4. Striker duo impressive
On a positive note, Giroud and Jovic both managed to get on the scoresheet. After the position had been a big problem for Milan in recent months, this is certainly encouraging.
Jovic, who had big issues at the start of the season, is now gaining momentum. He scored and assisted against Frosinone and followed that up with a nice striker’s goal yesterday. For quite some time, it looked like he had rescued at least a point for Milan.
Giroud made his return from suspension and scored a lovely header to equalise, as mentioned. In short, they were promising displays from both and Pioli will be hoping that they can continue like this. Especially in view of the Newcastle game.
5. Out of ideas?
Pioli has a lot of excuses to use and some of them are legit, such as the injury crisis. Some of the new additions have also struggled to make a difference, while Leao’s absence was always going to be difficult to handle.
However, having said all of this, the manager seems to be repetitive in his ways and continues to make quite strange choices. The ‘positionalism’ was brought up by the newspapers this morning and one can only agree.
This begs the following: is Pioli out of ideas? Should he be the man to bring this team to the next level? It will be interesting to see what decision Milan will make after the Newcastle game, depending on the outcome, and what will happen in the summer if he were to remain.
