AC Milan boss Stefano Pioli knew that the configuration of the midfield against Roma would be hugely influential in determining the outcome of the game, a report claims, and he got his moves right.
La Gazzetta dello Sport (as seen below) writes that perhaps not even Paulo Dybala – the great absentee – would have made a difference to the scoreline. With Romelu Lukaku on the pitch there was hope for Jose Mourinho’s side, but was absent in yet another big match.
The Roma midfield is always incapable of a change of pace and it is by exploiting this fact that Milan and Pioli achieved a small tactical masterpiece. Pioli has never lost to Mou, he always ‘reads’ him well.
Two years ago he invented a 4-3-3 to defeat the two Roma midfielders, whereas last night he kept the 4-2-3-1, however keeping Yacine Adli and Tijjani Reijnders in line and throwing Ruben Loftus-Cheek even further forward than Olivier Giroud.
It was almost as if the Englishman were the real centre-forward, because Giroud’s task was to drop into the midfield, taking Gianluca Mancini away from the Giallorossi’s penalty area and opening up the space to exploit.
The 1-0 goal naturally made the task easier, because Roma were off balance. With Theo Hernandez and Rafael Leao on one side plus Davide Calabria and Christian Pulisic on the other kept the visitors shifting from side to side. Then, Loftus-Cheek – as a fake attacking midfielder – disoriented Roma’s defence.
Two chances for Pulisic, Theo hitting the post and other chances kept Roma penned in, so much so that Celik’s shot in the 31st minute was the first for the capital club.
How was he disorienting anyone? Were we watching the same game? RLC didn’t really have any palpable contributions to the game except for sideways passes… even with Giroud dropping deeper, RLC wasn’t really driving forward…
His off the ball runs were excellent.
I really don’t understand the pile especially after a 3:1 where we should be, I don’t know, happy?
Lot of faux fans whining about RL-C; he’s an excellent addition. He’s a big unit, great at winning and holding the ball, and with good attacking instincts. No opposition relishes facing him.
So many whiners.
If they can’t enjoy a 3:1 win without finding somebody to attack then I really don’t understand why they bother.
Every player on that pitch contributed, and RLC did more than his share with his off the ball movement and tackles.
He’s a great physical unit, I have no qualms about his transfer. I just saw what he’s capable against PSG and want to see that every game. That’s all.
But so far that game was a one off.
I like RLC but he was terrible last game.
True, I realised his movements were probably tactical. He should’ve done a bit better with the ball though but…
I’ll take it.
That’s it I think. Not all the players will have a 10/10 match. One or two will have bad days; one or two will be tactically sacrificed (Bennacer last year away at Napoli comes to mind). The important thing is others step up.
It’s also why I’m not too hard on Leao.
I guess you would be indeed desorienting the opposition if you, yourself are desoriented. RLC followed the “If you don’t know your next move, neither can they”.
🤣very funny @Giga94…i still want to see him play the kind of game he had against PSG. Our biggest limitations in midfield had always been our size, and boy am I missing Diaz…he always made a plan after 9 failed attempts, he’ll get the 10th one spot on. But I am hopeful, after all the new recruits deserve a season of settling in.
He disoriented himself mostly.
I noticed several times how he was way far forward and Giroud was central. Didn’t think about it until now but yeah that would really put him out of rhythm.
I don’t think he had a good game, but I now think he did the job he was asked to do, and likely did it well.
My kid was a strong, speedy defender who was asked to play 9 one game. His job was to exhaust the defense in the first half. He was a disaster … Except we killed the other team in the second half because there defense was exhausted.
So I’d guess this was the professional version of that’s 🙂
There’s no way the intern who wrote this article actually watched the game.
The way i see it is that the problem is not RLC cuz AM is not even the position he plays in. Pioli insists to play him there to add physicality and cover to the midfield. Does it work? Sometimes
It does and other times it does not. I believe that we are in dire need of a pure technical quick attacking midfielder. RLC can play as dm or a nox to box midfielder – sarri has played him there on multiple occassions and he wasnt bad.
I like the player but Pioli needs to exploit him further in a different way. I would go for an experienced AM and a new DM next season to take the quality to another level.
Well he disoriented them by playing so badly the whole Roma team was confused as to why only that one player was playing such garbage while the rest were on fire. This thoroughly confused them And distracted them from what they were doing. They just couldn’t understand it 😂😂😂🤣🤣🤣
For me the biggest disappointment of the season. I expected him to become a dominating player in Serie A, but both defensively and with the ball he seems average. He is physical but not aggressive , which limits defensive contribution. With the ball he is quite inaccurate especially in the final third and with limited creativity. Reijnders is by far a more complete player.