After a disappointing 1-1 draw against Salernitana, AC Milan continued their poor league form by falling to a 3-1 defeat against Udinese at the Dacia Arena.
Milan got into a rhythm of sorts in February with three consecutive wins and clean sheets in Serie A with many fans presuming that the team had turned a corner, but a three-match winless run has followed with defeats against Fiorentina and Udinese coming either side of a home draw against Salernitana.
It also seems that the performances are getting worse too with Milan looking clueless on Saturday as they conceded early on and never really got going despite Zlatan Ibrahimovic’s equaliser, with Beto restoring the home side’s lead before the break and Kingsley Ehizibue sealing the win. Here are five things we learned…
1. Defensive disaster
As we mentioned above, Milan actually got out of the January chaos because of solid defending as they managed three clean sheets in a row in Serie A in addition to two against Spurs in the Champions League.
However, it would seem that the stability at the back has crumbled yet again with Kalulu, Thiaw and Tomori having a disaster of a night in Udine. The latter two in particular were awful with the Englishman at fault for the opener and the German beaten easily for the second goal.
The worrying thing is that it continues a trend established in the season so far whereby the defence struggle to put together a run of good games, always making errors leading to goals.
Only Cremonese (23) and Salernitana (23) have conceded more league goals than Milan in 2023 (21). pic.twitter.com/lF9vnAE0dD
— MilanData📊 (@acmilandata) March 20, 2023
2. Blunt and boring
To make matters worse, the attacking department hasn’t really been that impressive either even when Milan were winning games last month.
Other than scoring a penalty, Ibrahimovic wasn’t particularly useful as he dropped too deep in the first half, which wouldn’t be an issue if the Swede actually made a difference on the ball, but he was too slow and sloppy at times.
Brahim Diaz on the other hand had a decent game, but as always he can’t make the right decision when it matters so effectively he didn’t really make a difference.
Alexis Saelemaekers was another player that failed to make any significant impact as his end product was poor. Fode Ballo-Toure didn’t really offer the same as Theo Hernandez as expected but did try to go forward when he could.
3. Gone missing
Rafael Leao was left out of the previous point deliberately as the Portuguese is usually the one causing the majority of the trouble for the opposition, yet he has been struggling to do that for a while now.
The Portuguese forward has had a handful of good games if that since the turn of the year and his good ones were also not on the level he himself set. Against Udinese he struggled to make anything happen and was also sloppy on several occasions giving the ball away cheaply.
The saga regarding the contract renewal is still hanging over his head, but the former Lille needs to actually show his worth on the pitch since at the moment his demands do not seem justified and while we know what he is capable of, big earners need to be consistent difference makers.
#ACMilan are the furthest from top spot of any defending Serie A champion after 27 games in the three-points-per-win era (23).
[via @Gazzetta_it] pic.twitter.com/Yfgvm9KPg3
— MilanData📊 (@acmilandata) March 20, 2023
4. Not up to the task
Another issue for Milan has been the midfield, an area which last season was the pillar of the Rossoneri’s game. In recent months Tonali and Bennacer haven’t really lived up to the standard of last season and the depth that Pioli has is simply not good enough to replace the duo.
Krunic usually does well when called upon, thought he’s definitely not the missing piece of the puzzle, while Tommaso Pobega hasn’t been involved as much recently and that also applies to Aster Vranckx who hasn’t played in a while now.
This is a big problem that the management must address in the summer since nobody really replacedF Franck Kessie during the summer and having just two quality midfielders is simply not enough for such a big amount of games across the competitions.
5. Depth charge
While Pioli might be the one to blame for various parts of the game we have to be fair in saying that he plays the players that he has on his disposal and he can’t be blamed for the dreadful defending that we saw against Udinese.
Unfortunately for him, he doesn’t have solutions on the bench as all of the summer signings have been poor whilst the players that were there – Rebic, Ibrahimovic, Florenzi to name a few – are simply not good enough to be game changers.
#ACMilan have had just five goals scored by substitutes in Serie A so far this season.
Napoli leads the ranking with 12 goals from the bench, followed by Fiorentina (11) and Udinese (8). pic.twitter.com/fFHkp7kShy
— MilanData📊 (@acmilandata) March 19, 2023
Leao has been in a poor run of form, but the alternative is Rebic who is even worse when on the pitch. Giroud has been working overtime for the entire season aged 36, while in midfield there’s really not much to choose from.
If the coach was to stay beyond the summer, he would need a squad overhaul of sorts as this is simply not a group of players that can be competitive, nor one where he trusts everyone it seems.
