Summer mercato 2012

[k7r]

Nesta seem not too much impressed with Allegris tactics and training schedules....

In my opinion he is right to blame Allegri.....As writted by the Goal.com journalist, he made some foolish decisions like :
1.Omitting Pippo out of champions league squad,
2.Risking Thiago Silva against the Roma game which eventually crocked the player and was unable to play against the Blaugrana,
3.Playing Pato immediately after his recovery from injury,
4.Letting Pirlo go to Milan's main title contenders,
5.Signing Muntari on loan,
6.Playing Robinho in champions league matches instead of Pato/SES
7.Sticking to 4-3-1-2 system......No other formations and not sensible squad rotations...
8.Not using Merkel, Strasser effectively
etc
etc....

If Milan does not win the Serie-A, i think Allegri should look elsewhere.....i know this is too severe on him, but he is not flexible like Conte for instance.......

[Jay Crisp]

Pippo is useless this year.
Roma was a game we had to win so okay you're best players if fit.We were never beating Barca.
He isn't a doctor and was told Pato is fit not his fault.
It was G who left Pirlo go he wanted more than a year , and is ineffective with us we gave a very slow midfield.
Muntari not much choice when you have zero money .
Robinho is better than SES still , and Payo is never fit.

It can go both ways , Allegri is not to blame for this collapse , an average squad bar 2 or 3 players is and lack of investment .Plus loads of injury prone players.

[ACMILAN1983]

Nesta seem not too much impressed with Allegris tactics and training schedules....

In my opinion he is right to blame Allegri.....As writted by the Goal.com journalist, he made some foolish decisions like :
1.Omitting Pippo out of champions league squad,
2.Risking Thiago Silva against the Roma game which eventually crocked the player and was unable to play against the Blaugrana,
3.Playing Pato immediately after his recovery from injury,
4.Letting Pirlo go to Milan's main title contenders,
5.Signing Muntari on loan,
6.Playing Robinho in champions league matches instead of Pato/SES
7.Sticking to 4-3-1-2 system......No other formations and not sensible squad rotations...
8.Not using Merkel, Strasser effectively

etc
etc....

10.

If Milan does not win the Serie-A, i think Allegri should look elsewhere.....i know this is too severe on him, but he is not flexible like Conte for instance.......

The goal.com article didn't go into any real depth imo and only looked at our situation at a shallow level and therefore isn't providing any sensible arguments.

To your points...

Have you got any sources which suggest Nesta isn't impressed by Allegri's training. I've read nothing about it and therefore there's no way to back up this argument. If anything, our training sessions seem much more intense than in the past if videos are anything to go by.

1. Keeping a 38 year old Pippo was our (the club's) mistake. To have a player who can barely run nowerdays and to rely on him in the CL is just stupid. We need to move forward as one of our big problems over the recent years is relying on ageing stars.

2. Everyone blames Allegri for playing Thiago against Roma, but whilst we were at the time favourites for the league, we weren't particularly likely to win cL this season. Allegri saw this and decided to not compromise our league position in favour of CL. Obviously, the move backfired and he admitted this publicly. Otherwise, we'd have played Mexes and Bonera against Roma and we saw what risks we take when starting these two this past weekend, even if in the end we got a result against Roma.

3. The Pato (and general injury) situation is a disaster for the whole club and it's clearly not on Allegri alone. Allegri was given the go ahead to play Pato by the medical staff, who he has to trust as he's not a medical professional.

4. The Pirlo situation again is bigger than Allegri alone. Firstly, I would like to know how much he wanted to let Pirlo go. Whilst Pirlo isn't vital in his plans, I doubt Allegri fails to recognise that Pirlo's technical qualities aren't of use, even if he doesn't really fit into his plans. However, Pirlo left as we wouldn't meet his demands on the contract, with us only looking for yearly renewals for players over 30. Allegri had no choice in this, as management make these decisions, and Allegri had no choice in where Pirlo goes, as he was a free agent.

5. Signing Muntari hasn't been a bad move by either the club or Allegri, as he's proving himself to be really useful in a year where we need capable midfielders. If Allegri is to have one regret, I bet it's he didn't include Muntari in the CL squad, although he probably had his doubts like the rest of us.

6. You blame Allegri for rushing Pato back and then blame him for playing Robinho instead? You're contradicting yourself. It's also too much responsibility for SES to start him ahead of Robinho, and I doubt anyone can blame him for playing Robinho instead. It's not Allegri's fault Robinho can't finish from a couple of meters out in front of an open goal.

7. This is the biggest gripe I have when people complain of Allegri. Our basic shape is 4-3-1-2 but this doesn't mean we have no variation. We play progressive football and look to dictate games. Doing this we have to have consistent approaches to matches. However, our system isn't limited to one playing style as we vary our 4-3-1-2 to essentially cope with opponents. For example, against Barca, we rarely needed to stretch the game as Barca play to dominate and therefore Antonini and the other fullback rarely pushed high up the field. This is in direct contrast to when we play teams like Lecce in Serie A where we need to stretch opponents. Likewise, Ibra is often used to act as a creative force by dropping deep when we face closed teams that have a strict and rigid defence. On the other hand, Ibra's our reference point (target man) up front when we look to break teams down who push up in numbers, like the Roma match for example. 4-3-1-2 is just a basic shape and at times just some numbers, but how we apply our system tends to vary on a match to match basis.

8. He used Merkel and Strasser to great effect last season and it's one of the reasons they're actually valued in the first team squad. This season he's not had them until winter and they've been injured since. What else can he do?

9. etc. etc. means nothing

10. If Allegri's had to be anything, it's flexible given the injury crisis. He can't use Muntari in the same way he would Aquilani or Seedorf and he can't use Urby in the same way he would Boateng. These are different players who have different skill strengths. In order to accomodate them into our system he has to adjust the system to make it work coherently. Not completely changing the shape of the team isn't a sign of inflexibility. Also worth noting that Allegri when at Cagliari favoured 4-3-3, but it's at Milan he has had to change to a 4-3-1-2. Allegri's changes come in the subtleties of his system and what he's trying to achieve for a match. As for Conte, look at what most Juve fans say and he certainly gets his fair share of criticism. For example, his switch to a 3 man defence mid season made little sense when you look at how well they were doing, as well as his insistance on playing guys like Borriello ahead of Matri who actually makes a lot of sense. Also, if we're not using Pippo well enough, then we can't ignore Conte's poor use of Del Piero, who is still a very useful player in their squad yet is at times criminally ignored, especially when considering that one criticism of them this season is their lack of dynamic forwards to break down tight defences.

Allegri's not perfect and like all coaches he makes mistakes. However, what he's achieved with what he's had to work with is in my opinion admirable, and it'd be interesting to see how well he does with proper backing and investments. Unlike Inter or Chelsea, we don't just drop coaches everytime they have a bad period, and I'm definitely thankful for that.

[Gio-mania]

Spot on ACMILAN1983, spot on.

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Juve are interested in Seedorf should we not renew him. I am speechless.

[Kastriot]

i dont get this goal.com obsessesion with Allegri and Milan. All these itlaian editors are against Milan, and in a space of three days they are writing three articles related with Allgeri and making associations that he should leave. WTF???!!!

When Juve had their downfall they would write things how should Juve correct their game to catch MIlan, now they are just conspiring against MIlan. Maybe i am being biased but it is really annoying. Not once they wrote about how these injuries have affects Milan and how if Milan was fit we would not have these discussions as who would be the champions and if Allegri should go or not.

[ElMago99]

Regarding Pirlo, I don't think it is implied that we should have kept him. I think it is implied that MANAGEMENT should have extended his contract 2 years prior to him leaving, and then he should have been sold to England or Spain for 15-20M Euros. Make Money Plus send him OUT of Italy.

Never let your Legends go to direct rivals. That was a big mistake, not necessarily the fact he doesn't play for Milan anymore. If I remember correctly, fans across the Inter were calling for the retirement of Pirlo, Ambro, Seedorf, & Inzaghi, not to mention Gattuso.

Regarding Allegri, I'm not really a fan, but at this point let's just see what happens at the end of the season. As I explained before, there are so many issues (Pato situation, overall injuries, Ibra 1 man show, Bad Refereeing, no spending) that it's not ONLY Allegri's fault. There are many issues that hit us this year.

[Gio-mania]

I am naturally inclined to love all Milan players and coaches.

Allegri is part of the family now and I feel he has done a good job. He has made some mistakes, no doubt, but also some of the circumstances this season have been particular; the injury situation and "il caso Pato". It is difficult to say to what extent Allegri is responsible for the injuries, something others have mentioned.

I think an interesting question to ask ourselves is the following: what would another coach have done with the team this season? I don't really know what coach to take as a point of reference and this is a difficult comparison to make nonetheless. In general, do we think another coach would've made the players perform in another/better way? Do we think another coach would've made us get past Barcelona in the CL? Would another coach have kept us on top at this very moment?

Having written that I now notice I've unwittingly and unintentionally set up a comparison with Mourinho, one of the more successful coaches around. If he can't even get the better of Barça with Real, why would he manage with Milan? If he managed to drop 9 points in La Liga to Barça why would he have kept Milan on top in our situation? Apples and oranges, yes. But still.

As for the general question, how we would'veplayed under Mou, I have no idea.

Let me ask another question: how another coach make us a better team next season? Some have already mentioned that Capello and Mourinho need a management who buys them who they want. As the situation is now we will only be looking for freebies or budget players, and will possibly be willing to splash the cash on a star attacker if he's got a discounted price tag.

A bit off topic, but seriously who are we trying fool with this thread?

[GeoTav]

Regarding Pirlo, I don't think it is implied that we should have kept him. I think it is implied that MANAGEMENT should have extended his contract 2 years prior to him leaving, and then he should have been sold to England or Spain for 15-20M Euros. Make Money Plus send him OUT of Italy.

Never let your Legends go to direct rivals. That was a big mistake, not necessarily the fact he doesn't play for Milan anymore. If I remember correctly, fans across the Inter were calling for the retirement of Pirlo, Ambro, Seedorf, & Inzaghi, not to mention Gattuso.

Regarding Allegri, I'm not really a fan, but at this point let's just see what happens at the end of the season. As I explained before, there are so many issues (Pato situation, overall injuries, Ibra 1 man show, Bad Refereeing, no spending) that it's not ONLY Allegri's fault. There are many issues that hit us this year.

I think the problem with Pirlo is that many people thought he was done ... It's probably why our club let him go wherever he wanted. Actually, he just didn't fit our system anymore when he left (he needs players moving around him).

The sad part of the story is that with Nocerino and Boateng (guys able to make runs), the way we play with Ibrahimovic (long balls) and sometimes the good games from our LBs, he would have found again his level with us too.

[Jeff]

Only if our players are healthy!

[ACMILAN1983]

i dont get this goal.com obsessesion with Allegri and Milan. All these itlaian editors are against Milan, and in a space of three days they are writing three articles related with Allgeri and making associations that he should leave. WTF???!!!

When Juve had their downfall they would write things how should Juve correct their game to catch MIlan, now they are just conspiring against MIlan. Maybe i am being biased but it is really annoying. Not once they wrote about how these injuries have affects Milan and how if Milan was fit we would not have these discussions as who would be the champions and if Allegri should go or not.

I think Kris Voakes who writes for goal.com is a Juve fan. Don't know about the others.

Anyway, I hate to say this but it's not just goal.com, but rather the general press, especially the Italian press. There's constant talk about how Berlu and Allegri's relationship is pretty much dead with Galliani acting as a buffer between them.

Gazzetta today is now writing how there are new problems between Ibra and Allegri.

This is always a problem, when things aren't going our way then there's always talk of a crisis of some sort.

Spot on ACMILAN1983, spot on.

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Juve are interested in Seedorf should we not renew him. I am speechless.

Thanks.

I really don't get Juve supposedly going after our ageing players. Conte's system and ideals just don't seem to match this idea of getting ageing stars.