How has AC Milan’s 2023-24 season gone so far? Of course, like many things in football, it depends on perspective and whether the person in question chooses to take an optimistic, realistic or pessimistic outlook.
We have to start with the facts: Milan are currently second in the league and have no chance of catching Inter in the Scudetto race, they exited the Coppa Italia at the quarter-final stage and were knocked out of the Champions League in the group phase.
The Rossoneri are now hoping to avoid another trophyless season with a deep run in the Europa League where Roma await in the quarter-finals and the likes of Liverpool and Bayer Leverkusen may follow.
However, we can delve beneath this and find some of the trends that might put a different spin on things, depending on how you choose to interpret them.
The points
The most basic and obvious metric when it comes to measuring a team’s performance is the amount of points they have accrued in the league, because over the course of a 38-game season the table does not lie.
It is here that the first interesting statistic comes into play: Milan have 62 points after 29 Serie A games this season, and only in the 2021-22 Scudetto-winning campaign did they amass more (63).
Last season the Rossoneri were on 52 points at this stage of the season – a whole 10 points less, admittedly after a torturous January and February – while in 2020-21 the total was 60 points in what was Pioli’s first full season.
What the more cynical fans will perhaps rightly point to is the fact that Milan are currently 14 points off their city rivals Inter who are coasting to a second star. However, as has been highlighted plenty already, they are on a pace that takes some matching.
With attention thus turning to the fight for second, two months ago the Diavolo found themselves seven points behind Juventus but from late-January onwards the free fall of Max Allegri’s men began.
Juve not only gradually lost contact with Inter – who are now completely off the radar at +17 – but began to watch their backs as Pioli and his side caught up and, recently, overtook them.
The gap is three points and that return game at the Allianz Stadium will have a big bearing on who finishes with the prize of runners-up to Inter, which does actually have some financial incentive.
A final point, if you’ll pardon the pun: Milan are among the most in-form teams in the league today, with 17 points in their last eight games. Only Daniele De Rossi’s reborn Roma (19 points), Thiago Motta’s Bologna (22) and Simone’s Inzaghi’s Inter (22) did better.
The injuries
So why haven’t Milan been able to keep up this fantastic pace for the duration of the season, and what was the main reason that the Scudetto challenge derailed before the end of the year?
There are many factors of course, from a drop in the general performance levels of star players like Theo Hernandez, Rafael Leao and Mike Maignan, to the inability to rotate effectively and, as mentioned, the incredible pace of the Nerazzurri.
One thing that stands out above all and has been highlighted by Pioli as being more on the side of causation than correlation is that the Rossoneri’s defensive record simply hasn’t been good enough. More is to come on that specifically.
The injury date tells its own story as Milan have barely ever been able to field their strongest back four this season due to a collective emergency in the department, one that even saw Theo Hernandez shifted to centre-back.
Milan’s defenders have missed a combined 74 games this season due to injury. Pierre Kalulu (29), Malick Thiaw (14), Fikayo Tomori (13) and Simon Kjaer (10) have all missed over 10 out of the 41 games across all competitions.
Thiaw and Tomori have missed almost a third of the season, Kjaer 25%, while Kalulu’s 29 games missed will increase by a few more after his ligament injury. The Frenchman’s story is emblematic in a way as he spent four months out only to get injured quickly after he return.
Having all the starters available at Milanello (except Theo) over the break should help improve the mechanisms even more after a March that went against the trend in terms of the number of goals conceded, with five goals let in across five matches, at an average of one per game.
The goals
The broader topic of goals is an important one, because the amount scored and conceded each tell their own story in terms of how stretches of the season have gone, which when put together then paint an accurate picture of where that team should be.
This fits like a glove for Milan, who have scored 55 goals so far in the current Serie A campaign at an average of 1.9 per game. That gives them the joint-second-best attack in the entire league, level with Roma.
However, they have also conceded 33 goals. Only Monza in 10th (36) and Roma in fifth (35) have shipped more than that, and Milan have comfortably the worst defensive record in the top four.
Looking at the other teams in the top five (fifth will likely get a Champions League spot this time) it is quite easy to see why each team have failed to really get close to Inter.
For example, Roma as mentioned have scored plenty but have let in too many, ditto Milan. Bologna and Juventus have a good defensive record with 25 and 23 goals conceded respectively, but have scored 44 and 42.
Inter, and we promise this is the last time we will mention them, have scored 71 goals and let in 14. They have the best attack by a mile and the best defence by an even bigger mile.
As the Scudetto in 2021-22 showed for Milan balance is needed, but defence tends to win championships because having to score three and four goals to win games is unsustainable, as nice as it is if you can do it.
#ACMilan‘s record in the second half of games this season:
➤ 46-60 mins: 7 scored, 2 conceded
➤ 61-75 mins: 4 scored, 10 conceded
➤ 75-90+ mins: 12 scored, 8 conceded[via @SkySport] pic.twitter.com/0Q9i6hOLNh
— MilanData📊 (@acmilandata) March 1, 2024
The signings
It has already been well documented that Milan’s 2022 summer transfer window ended up being a nightmare. What should have been a fine-tuning after the Scudetto win turned into a situation that probably played a big role in Paolo Maldini and Ricky Massara losing their jobs.
Divock Origi was meant to provide competition for Olivier Giroud but he got just two goals and an assist. Charles De Ketelaere was tipped to be the creative force of the future in the playmaker role, yet got just the one assist.
Sergino Dest was a complete bust, Malick Thiaw showed promise in fairness but is of course a centre-back, and Aster Vranckx got the only other goal contribution (an assist) to leave a grand total of five (two goals, three assists) for the 2022 summer additions.
The Rossoneri’s summer signings have 57 goal contributions in 2023-24 so far. Yes, you read that right, fifty seven. Of the 77 goals scored by Milan in total this season (all competitions), 40 of them were from them, which is precisely 51.9 percent.
The breakdown is as follows for goals: Pulisic 12, Loftus-Cheek 9, Jovic 8, Okafor 5, Reijnders 3, Chukwueze 3. Assists: Pulisic 8, Okafor 2, Jovic 1, Loftus-Cheek 1, Chukwueze 1, Reijnders 3, Musah 1.
Sunday’s win in Verona was symbolic in a way. Theo Hernandez scored the opener before Christian Pulisic and Samuel Chukwueze – both signed last summer to compete for the same spot – each got their name on the scoresheet.
Even the likes of Luka Jovic (eight goals at one every 121 minutes) and Noah Okafor (five goals at one every 155 minutes) have been very productive off the bench, and the €36m bargain of the ‘Blues Brothers’ deserves its own piece.
The big games
We wrote a feature not that long ago which put forward the notion that Pioli’s time at Milan – for all the records he has broken in terms of longevity and the things he has achieved – might be remembered more for the games he lost than he won.
That brings us to Milan’s record in the ‘big games’ in 2023-24, i.e. those in the Champions League and against teams that are or were considered to be rivals for a top-four spot, or potentially for the title. The games in italics were UCL or Coppa Italia.
➤ Roma 1-2 W
➤ Inter 5-1 L
➤ Newcastle 0-0 D
➤ Lazio 2-0 W
➤ Dortmund 0-0 D
➤ Juventus 0-1 L
➤ PSG 3-0 L
➤ Napoli 2-2 D
➤ PSG 2-1 W
➤ Dortmund 1-3 L
➤ Atalanta 3-2 L
➤ Newcastle 1-2 W
➤ Atalanta 1-2 L
➤ Roma 3-1 W
➤ Napoli 1-0 W
➤ Atalanta 1-1 D
➤ Lazio 1-0 W
Of the 17 games listed above, Milan won seven. This is largely boosted by the victories in 2024 in the league, and against two opponents in Napoli and Lazio who were in crisis at the time. Six losses and four draws complete the picture.
Some might argue that isn’t too bad, yet it was the timing and the magnitude of those defeats which have essentially derailed the various trophy quests.
Then of course there is the 5-1 derby defeat to Inter, which made the hierarchies very clear in round four of the Serie A season and made it five losses to the Nerazzurri in the 2023 calendar year.
This article is of course about this season’s stats, but Milan’s record in derbies under Pioli deserves mention: three wins, two draws, nine losses, 12 goals scored, 29 goals conceded.
Conclusion
What should fans take from all of the above? Whatever they want, as is their right. However, it does present an interesting counter-balance: the idea that Milan are going at a pace in the league that in most other seasons would have them fighting for the title, despite having some obvious defects.
There is the plus side of the 10 new signings generally adapting well to playing in Italy given so many came from abroad, then the downside is that the injury problem has not been fixed and thus has contributed to some of the crises.
It feels as though a lot depends on the Europa League. If the Rossoneri were to hoist the only trophy missing from their showcase in Dublin it would help feel that the rollercoaster was all for something. Otherwise, there are simply good fragments to pick up and try to piece together a better jigsaw in 2024-25.
