Tuesday night, in Bologna, Milan will be tested in a few different ways. For one, We know that Milan have done well against the top of the table sides, and notoriously poor against the lower table or newly promoted sides. But Bologna are right in the middle, in 10th place. While Allegri pointed out their recent league record has been poor, they are coming off of a midweek win in the Europa League last week. These present unknown dangers for a Milan team struggling to hold itself together with duct tape, a team that only improved by one player in the transfer window, and has many injuries. Then, there's the fact that Milan haven't played in nine days, so in these and many ways, it will be a Tuesday trial.
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| Our back line especially will be tested on Tuesday night. |
Last season's away match to Bologna was drowned first in flooding, then in politics, and finally was rescheduled at the worst point in our season, and ended badly for Milan. Then, we managed a miraculous win for our home fixture, which ironically was schedule five days before our Coppa Italia Final with Bologna, which they won amidst controversy on and off the pitch. And while only nine of those players remain for Milan, and we have an entirely different manager, staff, and an actual Sporting Director, we have a bit of a score to settle with Vincenzo Italiano's men.
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| Happy for Pobega, but this still stings because of the controversies. |
Italiano's men played their last league match nine days ago, a 3-2 loss away to Genoa. But then they claimed a resounding 3-0 victory over Maccabi Tel Aviv in the Europa League on Thursday. For that match, Italiano lined up a 4-3-3 with: Skorupski; Zortea, Vitík, Casale, Miranda; Moro, Freuler, Ferguson; Orsolini, Castro, and Rabiot's sparring partner, Jon Rowe. Skorupski will be suspended for this match, as he was sent off vs. Genoa. So we will likely either see the experienced Ravaglia in goal, who replaces Skorupski in that match, unless Italiano trusts his 17 year-old phenom Pessina. Italiano also has two players who have been dealing with injuries and are uncertain for this match: Lucumi and De Silvestri.
Milan have been through a lot in the past nine days since their draw with Roma. First, RedBird refinanced the club with Comvest Credit Partners, paying off the vendor loan to Elliott Management. This means Gordon Singer and Dominic Mitchell, the two Elliott Board members, will be stepping down, and Elliott are now officially gone. Which is a shame, because Elliott actually cared about Milan, and Gordon Singer was still attending Milan matches when he could, unlike Gerald, who has not been to a Milan match in about 18 months. He was even in Milano ahead of the Roma match, but specifically scheduled his trip midweek so as not to have to attend a match.
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| Finally, Maignan. |
Next up, our captain, Mike Maignan finally signed his contract renewal. It was a five year deal, reportedly worth €5 million per year, plus €2 million per year in bonuses, same as Leão's/ Maignan has been voted MVP in back to back months for Milan, has won a number of match MVP votes, and been awarded a few Player of the Match awards from Serie A, as well. His work with Claudio Filippi, the new goalkeeping coach and one of the best in Europe, if not the world, has paid off, as Maignan is now back in the top five or higher of goalkeepers in Europe right now. And to think that Milan had agreed to a contract extension with him around this time last season, then they never actually had him sign it, but rather withdrew the offer. That led to all the drama over the summer with him wanting to leave, and with his contract expiring in June, this renewal means everything to his teammates and the fans.
Other than that, the transfer window was very quiet for the first team. Origi finally relinquished his massive salary, making room for Füllkrug, who is a beast even with a broken toe. But other than that, all talks of an experienced center back, and a running list of potential strikers all failed to materialize, including a last minute push for Jean-Philippe Mateta that failed after it was discovered he has a serious cartilage problem in his knee and needs to have surgery to correct it. Milan made a lot of moves both in and out for Milan Futuro, signing some players who are supposed to be very good, but we will see if they can help Oddo's team in Serie D.
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| Our one healthy attacker. Will he be enough? |
As for this match, once again, Allegri has called up the least wounded players to travel to Bologna. While Santi Gimenez is finally approaching the end of his rehabilitation, he still has yet to return to training, so definitely will not be available yet. And it is reported that neither Pulisic nor Saelemakers have traveled with the team. Reports suggest that Leão may not start, as he is still struggling with his long-term muscle issue, although he will be available. This means that Athekame or Loftus-Cheek will play on the right, according to Allegri, and with Füllkrug's toe still broken, Nkunku is the only guaranteed starter up front.
None of those are are great signs for a team struggling to keep its head above water. Oh, and Athekame, Rabiot, and Fofana are all one card away from suspension, too, which could impact upcoming matches. Milan did pull off the win in our home match against Bologna in September, despite playing pretty poorly and having some questionable VAR refereeing from Fabbri for Mercenaro, which led to him revoking a penalty, and Allegri losing it and getting sent off. It was the match where Modrić scored his singular goal for Milan thus far, so maybe he will strike again, who knows?
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| Can he repeat his magic? |
What is certain is that winning this match will be like Allegri trying to navigate a damaged ship safely into port. Bologna present a credible threat, even if all our players were healthy, which they are not. Having had basically too much rest between matches could actually be a factor for Milan, too. And who knows what the refereeing will look like Manganiello has been assigned, but this is a horrific season for refereeing.
And with Inter maybe possibly perhaps facing some kind of consequences for having a fan throw a firework at Cremonese's goalkeeper on Sunday, I am sure Marotta has been making calls. Despite the fact that Bologna are well behind the pack chasing European spots, three points for them right now and none for Milan very much benefits Milan. So our guys will need to be focused and play their best match against a deceptively difficult opponent. That is why this will be Milan's Tuesday Trial.
This post inspired by the music of She Wants Revenge's "These Things"