Former AC Milan coach Arrigo Sacchi has claimed that the Rossoneri should now be trying to finish in second place after the dip in form that Juventus have suffered.
Speaking to La Gazzetta dello Sport (via Milan News), Sacchi revealed that he actually expected Juventus to fall away from Inter in the title race and towards Milan in third, creating a battle for the runners-up spot.
There is now only one point between Milan and Juventus, whilst there is an eight-point gap between the Rossoneri and Inter.
Juventus lost to Inter recently and have then lost at home to Udinese, meaning their title charge has really stalled.
Sacchi was asked if he saw that dip from Juventus coming, to which he said: “If I say yes, I come off as presumptuous. But I have to admit that the defeat against Udinese, in my opinion, is the result of the defeat a week ago, at San Siro against Inter,” Sacchi said.
“Therefore, something could be felt in the air. At San Siro, Allegri’s boys gave their all and understood that they were inferior to Inter. These are matches that leave their mark on you, physically and mentally. Once they realized that they probably wouldn’t win the race for the title, they perhaps let their guard down a little. Furthermore, Juve has a very young team, there is little experience, they have no leader men. All this weighs heavily in the long run.”
Building on that, Sacchi discussed the good form that Milan have produced in 2024 so far and he said that they should really be aiming to finish second now, rather than accepting third place and a Champions League qualification spot.
“Milan are going through a good period of form, and they also showed it on Sunday evening against Napoli. They are only one point behind Juve and therefore it is logical that they aim to finish second. However, it should not be forgotten that the Rossoneri are also involved in the Europa League, while Juve have no European matches and can prepare for the whole week without wasting energy. This is no small detail. It will be an exciting sprint all the way through,” he said.
With the gap to Inter being eight points, which could grow to 11 if they win their game in hand, Milan cannot expect to catch Inter unless there is a serious drop in the Nerazzurri’s quality between now and the end of the campaign.
If you can still do the Scudetto. Why does it have to be Position 2. Remember… Entering Week 27, Inter will run out of gas.
Inter won’t run out of gas. They have a lot of depth.
We had depth too but losing 5 CBs to injury list can have negative effects. Inter are also extremely lucky to avoid injury crises. Or have been. Hoping that will chance drastically soon. Take away Lautaro & Thuram for a month and see what would happen. Or 5-6 CBs.
*change
Ask if Inter can put Radu back in goal…
Would be an absolute miracle if we caught them
They clearly have a better physical team than ours.
They almost never struggle with injuries, despite starting the same players week in week out.
they still in CL & more oldies than youngsters so i’m optimist
Simple. Just focus on winning the next match. Repeat and repeat. 3 points at a time. At the end of May we’ll see where that takes us.
It’s football, anything can happen. A few injuries on inter’s part could change things despite their depth.
We are doing really well .i believe we are perhaps the best form team in the leauge at the moment ..
I think inter will have a dip in form ,,,but we won’t catch them ,,,but of course 3 rd would still be amazing
Yes second even better ,,,but for those that called for another coach was uttterly wrong ..pioli is one of the best …if we could get to the Europa league final .
This in my opinion will be a very good season indeed .
I love all our fans …it’s great hearing from you all .
I’d be impressed if we end up overtaking Juve but it’s very doable. At a point in time I even thought the Scudetto was also doable. In the end it’s the upper table teams we tend to take a hit with and that’s not going to cut it. But i agree with Sacchi….I saw that Juve game and Inter was a class above like they are in the whole league. They can actually sell their good players and “lower themselves” to the rest of the league for next year while fixing their books. That’s how good they are.
Also for the folks thinking Inter will start to tire due to their European committments…just remember we also have European committments and they’re not the ones with favourable timimg either. Playing on Thursday night, WE WILL take a hit in the league and injuries can pile up again.
second, third and fourth place makes no difference. In the end all of them lead to the UCL, and none of them is a scudetto.
I’d say if we find ourselves confortable at some point way far from the fifth place, perhaps we should rest some players and focus on the Europa League, but I don’t think we can win it.