Teams news: Milan are without the suspended Rodrigo Ely and without Philippe Mexes, Jose Mauri, Jeremy Menez, Alessandro Matri and M’Baye Niang. Empoli have to do without Vincent Laurini. The game kicks off at 20:45 CET at the Rossoneri home stadium – Stadio San Siro.
Watch the match highlights
AC Milan (4-3-1-2) – Sinisa Mihajlovic
Diego Lopez; Mattia De Sciglio, Cristian Zapata, Alessio Romagnoli, Luca Antonelli; Andrea Bertolacci, Nigel De Jong, Antonio Nocerino; Suso; Carlos Bacca, Luiz Adriano.
Bench: Abbiati, Donnarumma, Abate, Alex, Zaccardo, Montolivo, Poli, Bonaventura, Kucka, Honda, Balotelli, Cerci.
Empoli F.C (4-3-1-2) – Marco Giampaolo
Łukasz Skorupski; Marco Zambelli, Lorenzo Tonelli, Federico Barba, Mário Rui; Piotr Zieliński, Assane Dioussé, Daniele Croce; Riccardo Saponara; Manuel Pucciarelli, Massimo Maccarone.
Bench: Pugliesi, Pelagotti, Costa, Camporese, Martinelli, Bittante, Krunic, Signorelli, Ronaldo, Maiello, Mchedlidze, Piu.
Referee: Piero Giacomelli.
I’m glad some dudes are finally comprehending what football is all about. At least they now know De Jong is s**t as a regista.
De Jong is far from what you say he is… He simply had a rough match defending Sapo… Imagine Pirlo, or Monti trying to mark Sapo today? Riccardo played well, this caused Nigel to have a rough match… Some of you guys still dont get it…Nigels job it to win the ball back and quickly distribute it to a playmaker, he is world class at this. Problem was Berto, Noce, and Susos movements made Nigel the focal point of our midfield, which made it much harder to keep track of Sapo… I admit Nigel had an off day, forgive me… Read more »
You are blind if you really believe that de jong is good with the ball in hes feet. He suck so bad he almost f up the games. all he can do really is interception. He will never be our regista and he is playing the role out there without success. De jong should play on the right midfield like Guttasso did. Work hard and intercept. simply a cover for our Skipper our carrier who should sit in the middle and support everyone around him with perfect passes. thats what we need. Not a slow bulldog who create nothing but… Read more »
Yes, you will never have a strong midfield when De Jong is playing. No matter who you play next to him. He is the worst Milan captain ever. Sure, sometimes he intercepts a ball but more often he misses and then he has to chase the player and we know he’s slow. He’s also not big and strong. He acts like it, but he is not. Look at his one-to-one duels, he is the one who hits the ground first. He’s not strong in the air. Passing is mediocre. He’s not that smart either, he doesn’t see stuff happening on… Read more »
yes your right, when he was at city he got out played. when you see him play alongside the likes of vincent kompany you can easly see how stupid and clomsy he looks. I believe De Jong is our main problem when we try to build up play from the back. The back 4 will try to pass the ball to the one in the center the regista so that he can spread the passes around the field. but what happends is: the ball gets to de jong. and then he passes it back to the defenders or he passes… Read more »
Congratulations Milan.
I didn’t want to comment about his transfer and judge him until I see him play. Not he confirmed my suspicions. Kucka is another Birsa.
Now*
he is going to be better than bertolacci…
I hope so..
MOTM hands down Luiz Adriano, we’re starting to see a partnership between bacca and him, we cud’ve gotten more if bacca was a lil bit less selfish, but he’s a striker after all. Flop of the match goes to Bertolacci..tried hard but made too many mistakes, De Jong didn’t look good either especially on the 1st half.. In a way this is a good win for 2 reasons: A. it’s a win.. B. yet we didn’t play well enough to make a case for Galliani not to sign Witsel.
Adriano had a good game but no way was he MOTM.
We won 2-1, he scored a goal, and provide for the other one. Hence.
Can you recall any other moment where he had the ball? I’m not blaming it on him that he didn’t get the ball, I’m blaming it on the midfielders who were astonishingly bad.
Doesn’t matter, he’s still the MOTM for the aforementioned reasons
I mean can you recall any moment in which any other player had the ball?
He was the best on the field today. Enough said.
Forza Milan! 3 points tastes real good. I think Zapata and Romagnoli looked more solid in central defence than what we’ve seen in a while. I hope the two become the regular starters. Antonelli did a good job offensively. However, the midfield was struggling. We desperately need a solid regista, as of now we’re not even able to hold the ball and control the midfield against Empoli at San Siro… A creative trequartista wouldn’t hurt either. Adriano and Bacca are shaping up, but it didn’t look like we even had a trequartista today, giving them very little to work with.… Read more »
Because after bona came in we play 4-4-2..cmiiw
Nocerino was horrible.
dude, bonnaventura provided for the second goal… Nocerino was shit, Zapata was awkward as always. Did you watch the same game as he rest of us?
This game just confirmed my early suspicions of Bertolacci being worse or on the same level as Bonaventura. The midfield is crying out for some pace and creativity. In the absence of quality midfielders we have resorted to overworked Bacca who almost played as a trequartista and giving Antonelli the ball for inspiration. It was so painful to watch.
In other news, I read on Football Italia that Curva Sud were calling out Galliani tonight and telling him to resign. If so I fully agree with them.
What I learned from this extremely frustrating fixture. 1. De Jong is not playing well period. He’s not giving the same heart that he gave last year and his passing is mediocre at best. Also he is giving lots of space to the attackers and they are having way too much space to operate. 2. Bertolacci –> bench. Poor with everything he did. I’ve defended him in other games because he needs time but in truth time is not something Milan have as we need results NOW. His positioning is poor. He never opens up for his teammates to pass… Read more »
Abate
Thought he was injured but yeah I agree.
Nocerino was no worse than bertolacci and de jong. He got substituted just becuase he doesnt come with hefty price tag like berto or reputation like de jong.
Nigel De Jong – 6.5 – Committed
The Rossoneri captain put in a bustling performance and was always committed in the tackle. Pulled off a number of risky slide tackles that could have resulted in danger for the Dutchman. He regularly dropped back into the defence to allow both full-backs to push forwards.
i think abate should start instead of de sciglio this guy is doing nothing!
Bacca n adriano is beast, they can score even without midfield, can you imagine if we have midfield, how many goals they can score???
Lopes is great, can you imagine if we have a pair quality cb..
Montolivo of two seasons ago where are you? 🙁 we need a deep lying play maker and De jong isn’t that….he’s only good at one thing and one thing only, break up plays, he can’t create at all…the only two people he passes to on the pitch is Lopez and De sciglio on the right flank…modern football isn’t about having an overly defensive player in front of the defense, look at Modric and Kroos in Real madrid, look at Matic and Fabregas in Chelsea, look at Alonso in Bayern etc. I wish Monto can go back to who he was.… Read more »
@Lucas! De Jong can only do better ifhe have someone to assist him, when ever he marks noone to cover up his space and that’s what Oli does chaging attackers around just like Gattuso to relief De Jong dirty job.. Barlotaci and Bona are weaking marking
I was really hoping for a slim unconvincing win and thankfully, that’s what happened. I say this because I want Galliani to realize that signing a top quality midfielder is an absolute must We have top-notch strikers but our problem is an obvious one. Our defense lacks protection from the midfield, and our attack lacks service from the midfield. Our midfield basically can’t connect the defense with the attack. I love De Jong, but he’s a major cause of this. Whenever he plays, his positioning leaves our defense exposed and since he is our only defensive midfielder, our defense becomes… Read more »
My brother, I love monty too but he’s completely out of form. He’s had a poor showing whenever he has played, he just hasn’t been the same since his injury.
Nope it wont Witsel is so overrated
Miha is the best coach we have had in the last 5 years simplt based on his comments after the match. Read here:
http://www.football-italia.net/72276/mihajlovic-milan-were-terrible
We have had this non-existent midfield + negative psychological problem for a very long time I would say near 4+ years now, Miha is the first coach since then who has already addressed this so obvious yet frustrating problem more then once so early in the season. Now that he knows what the problem is and has made it clear lets hope he can vanquish this ever so frustrating curse!
Nobody mention Saponara…. best midfielder in that match…. currently best midfielder so far this present season with 2goals in two match… even de jong can’t stop him on several occasions… he was just the only player given our midfield and defence problem….( not just only milan please check his last match vs verona) I just don’t know why Galliani sold this young beautiful player…. . Can you remember that he even scored more goals and assist than niang on loan last season and they both went on loan at rhe same time… I will love you fans to tell me… Read more »
They sold him because of inzaghi and hes 4-5-1. They tryed deplying him in the center mid but with no success. He would have been perfect to day in this system. but he dident fit in the system of inzaghi.
you see people now starting to blame dejong. dejong’s not the problem as a player, he’s a strong DMF, they are just playing him in a wrong position. gattuso and adgar david are top DMFs but who’ll ask of them for playmaking? ?? ..not like a DMF should always play infront of the defense,especially when the formation relys on the middle man for some creativity. I would always play dejong I actually like him but the fact Is team will play better with someone more creative infront of the defense. if they fail to buy a deep playmaker and montolivo… Read more »
Sinisa Mihajlovic was furious with Milan despite a 2-1 win over Empoli. “We didn’t deserve victory. Nothing has changed.” The Rossoneri opened their season with a 2-0 defeat at Fiorentina, but this evening Carlos Bacca and Luiz Adriano secured the result. “We did not deserve to win,” slammed the Coach to reporters. “Nothing has changed from last season. There was too much fear. After Empoli scored there was a total blackout. “The only reason we won was thanks to the two strikers who got goals out of nowhere. “The only thing to save about tonight was the result. We did… Read more »
The curva sud put unnecessary pressure on the players and the coach. It’s hard to take them seriouse. They are just a bunch of racist hooligans and galliani knows that. That’s why he just ignores them. When they had to tell inzaghi that he is terrible at coaching they couldn’t, because he is Italian. Now it’s only the beginning of the season and they are already complaining about mihajlovic. Mihajlovic said something about “discovering the joy of playing football”. This is exactly what Seedorf used to talk about. This team needs to be at ease psychologically. And they won’t do… Read more »
I thought they were asking for the removal from Galliani from Milan.
4-3-1-2 is boring formation
please switch to 4-2-3-1
lopez
abate-mexes-romagnoli-antonelli
montolivo-dejong
luiz adriano-balotelli-bonaventura
bacca
Thanks god, thanks Bacca, Adriano and all the team.
I hope to watch a great game in derbi.Forza Milan
We need Julian Draxler for cm
I don’t know why some people who don’t know how to watch game talk sometimes? DE JONG is the only reason we didn’t concede more. look at his tackles they are perfectly done. For crying out loud, we have four midfielders on the pitch. One on the left, right and middle and a trequartista(Suso) who suppose to link play to the strikers, but was nowhere to be found. The two other midfielders they are absolutely nonsense (Noce & Bert.) De jong has to switch to their angle to make tackle at times leaving the center, look at the goal we… Read more »
Player Ratings: AC Milan 2-1 Empoli from (Forza italian Football) Diego Lopez – 6 – Untroubled The Spaniard could not have kept out Riccardo Saponara’s crisp strike. Despite his goal being the more under threat throughout the game, he remained relatively untroubled. Mattia De Sciglio – 6 – Reliable The marauding full-back had plenty of space to roam and spent more of his time pushing forwards but was not too heavily troubled defensively. Cristian Zapata – 6.5 – Preventative The central defender was caught out of position for the opening Empoli goal, having been drawn out by Massimo Maccarone. His… Read more »
I know I might take a lot of heat on this buuuut…. I believe that dejong is a major problem in the midfield. He essentially acts as a 5th defender (which we don’t need) and he takes away from is controlling the midfield and dominating the game offensively. I just don’t see him participating in the attack and, honestly is useless for our defense… I know that dejong is a great player , but cmon…. the role that plays is completely useless.
Great finishing from Bacca! Now I m just imagining him with good feeder from midfield ‘o’
I heard Witsel choose Milan over Juve if he leave Zenith.
Can we get any lower than this, Empoli was attackin us at San Siro…poor game,lucy win,of course 3 points are always welcome but i fear it’s gonna be a loooooong season and we can forget about fighting for the CL spot,if we are lucky we will reach 6th position. I’m not going to start who played badly coz there are a lot,i feel the same problem for years now that our off the ball movement is very bad.The connection from defence to midfield sucks big time,in the first half they had a backpass to the keeper like 20 times at… Read more »
How sure are we that witsel will deliver on coming to Milan? Zenit lost at home 1-3 to a completely lesser opponent with witsel on the pitch and Zenit have been aweful for sometime now… why not go for Oscar or Draxler?
Don’t know why you people are shouting “sign this..sign that”…we are not signing nothing no more,the mercato is over for us,I believe stone cold is okay with all the rubbish we’ve signed so far…poli is even better than Berto..what the heck
I just hope Galiani is reading all these comments, can’t understand why he takes sole decision about who Milan should buy or not. He should be checked if can’t be sacked.
i dont want comment anything.. i wanna celebrate our victory… God answer my pray milan win 2-1… i believe our management will find a way about this team.. so lets hope or next games will be another victory
ZAPATA WAS INCREDIBLE YESTERDAY !!!
ELY WAS HORRIBLE AND I DONT WANT TO SEE HIM AGAIN AS STARTER.
HE CANT EVEN MARK AN ATTACKER…
HE HAS BAD PLACEMENT IN THE FIELD..
IM NOT A DISLIKER OF MILANS PLAYERS BUT WHEN I WATCH THIS PLAYER IN 2 MATCHES AND HE CANT EVEN MARK AN OPPONENT I CANT STAY AND DONT SPEAK AT ALL..