AC Milan Blog

The boss of the Partenopei admits he is frustrated with his side's poor return in front of goal, but is hopeful they can generate a positive response to their defeat to Genoa
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AC Milan defender Alessandro Nesta has been ruled out of Sunday's Serie A clash with Napoli with a muscle strain, his club said on their website.
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The champions have been dealt a blow ahead of their key Serie A fixture against Walter Mazzarri's men, after the experienced stopper was forced off the training field on Saturday
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The Italian is not worried about his team's recent performances and believes Walter Mazzarri's men will be difficult opponents at San Siro this weekend
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MILANELLO - Training has come to a close at the Milanello sports centre.
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MILAN – Here’s what Walter mazzarri had to say during his press conference before leaving for Milan:“I wouldn’t sign for a draw. We have to give everything we have and I’d like to do better in the league. I don’t want to talk about the adversary’s formation. We know each other well. From my players tomorrow, I expert a show of personality. We’ll have to be at our best. Also we tend to do well on the big stages, I hope that’s not been forgotten. It’s true that Milan have lost their last game but they won all the previous games at a stroll. We know it’ll be tough but we’ll give it our all.”
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MILANELLO - Adriano Galliani recognizes Ignazio Abate reaching the 100 mark for the Rossoneri.
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MILANELLO - Here are the 20 players called up by coach Allegri for Milan-Napoli: Abbiati, Amelia, Abate, Antonini, Bonera, Ely (53), Mesbah, Mexes, Thiago Silva, Zambrotta, Ambrosini, Cristante (34), Emanuelson, Nocerino, Seedorf, Van Bommel, El Shaarawy, Ibrahimovic, Maxi Lopez, Robinho
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MILAN – Here are the 20 players called up by Walter Mazzarri for tomorrow’s game against Milan at the San Siro: De Sanctis, Rosati, Colombo, Aronica, Britos, Campagnaro, Cannavaro, Fernandez, Dossena, Maggio, Hamsik, Zuniga, Dzemaili, Gargano, Inler, Cavani, Lavezzi, Pandev, Chavez, Vargas.
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(IN THE PHOTO: Ignazio Abate, his first 100 games for the club) MILAN – 3 December 2003 he made his debut at 17 year old with the Milan shirt on his back in an Italian Cup match against Sampdoria. More than 8 years later, Ignazio Abate reaches 100 appearances with the reigning Italian champions. Two in 2003/2004, 36 in 2009/2010 after a trip around the country gaining experience. The 37 games last season and 25 so far in this campaign. Adriano Galliani, as tradition dictates, gave a sghot speech to the player at the Milanello sports centre before training today. “He made his debut with us at a very young age, only 17. It was during a game in 2003 in Genova against Sampdoria. Then after gaining some experience but without ever losing track of him, we brought him back from Empoli alongside Luca Antonini. He’s back at home now and that’s where he’ll stay. It took more than 8 years to get to 100 appearances but I’m sure it’ll take much less to get to 200. Ignazio is an example to all. He got here as an 11 year old and he found his fortune. The club wishes him all the best.”
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MILAN – After Mark Van Bommel’s 500 league games, it’s another important moment for another Rossoneri. Ignazio Abate, prior to today’s training session, will be presented with an award by Club CEO Adriano Galliani for having reached 100 games with the club that he has always supported.
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MILANELLO - Massimiliano Allegri held his press conference ahead of Milan-Napoli: "We have to take it one game at a time."
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MILANELLO – Here’s what Massimiliano Allegri had to say in today’s press conference ahead of Milan-Napoli: "In the five games played, we played them well and except for the match in Bergamo, we won them all quite easily. In the two games we lost we paid a high price for the mistakes made. The team is in the semi-final of the Italian Cup, the last 16 of the Champions League and has one point less than this time last year.” “They’ve done all they can to get the pitch ready at the San Siro ahead of the game. Necessity is the mother of invention and we’ll try and play a big game to get back winning because we’ll be up against a team that has important qualities both individually and collectively. There’s a possible gap of more than 15 points between Napoli and the top spot so they could get back into the top spots. It’ll be harder for them this year because they’re in three competitions and maybe they’re not used to that but they’re having a good year and they played well on Wednesday. “I’m not worried about the criticism. It’s normal that when a team loses, the first man in the cross hairs is the coach, but we’ve been through worse moments. We have a few absences that don’t allow me to change the team from game to game but we have players who know how to play well when they’re called upon. I’m satisfied with how we’re doing but in football everyone has an opinion and they can change from day to day. A team doesn’t become bad after one loss. We need balance now that we’re coming from a loss but we need that even if we had won 10 in a row. “Football is not basketball. Changing for the sake of it is not a good idea and also I believe that I’m able to get the best out of this team’s characteristics from the players I have available. The team is used to playing like this, the only change is a trequartista.” I definitely don’t feel like Antonio Conte is making fun of me. I just look at my house and not the others. In any case, I believe he underestimates his team by continuing to say that we’re the favourites and I don’t think it’s good to underestimate your players.” “It’s impossible to work on the players’ fitness as we have a game every three days. We have to stay calm and anyway, there’s no reason to be alarmed. There’s still a lot of points up for grabs. We need to understand our mistakes and learn from them. We’re a team that fighting on all fronts and that makes me happy.” The team is fine and they’re working well. At the moment, we have certain players with certain characteristics available. The three up front in Novara played a good game in the second half and they played well in Rome as well. From the players I have available I’ll obviously be asking for different things than I would from Boateng.” Ibra plays well with Robinho and El Shaarway and I think he’ll play well with Maxi Lopez. We’re waiting for Pato to come back and he’s making progress. In any case, Ibra can play well with anyone.” “The ref are doing their job well and obviously there will be mistakes made in your favour or against you. But if you look back at the end of the season, they even themselves out.” “At the moment, the injury situation is not clear. No one has come back yet and It’s hard to see anyone back for the game against Arsenal. It’s not good to build up expectations if the players won’t be available. They’re all working together to get back as soon as they can and I hope it’ll be sooner rather than later.” “Tomorrow I’ll have 4 midfielders available and I’ll have to decide which one doesn’t play. There’ll be two strikers as well.” “Going back to Wednesday’s game, I subbed Ambrosini and El Shaarawy because I thought that with Emanuelson and Seedorf we could have got back in the game but the changes didn’t work.” “We don’t have any problems but we definitely need to improve, as always, because this is a team that has potential to do better. Maybe we weren’t competitive enough in the last few games, even those we won. Sometimes without realising it you try a bit less if you know that you can win the game in any moment but then things can change and you concede. You have to keep the attention level high always.” “I think that last year when Ibra was suspended, Pato and Robinho filled the gap. This year Pato has never been available and Robinho has been out for two months. Until now the midfield has picked up the slack. We just need to be more careful and not concede a goal from the first mistake we make.”  I hope that next Wednesday it’ll be less cold. An emergency situation like this only lasts for a week and not for a month and they’ve moved all kick offs to the afternoon which is the right thing to do.” “I’m calm and aware of what we’ve done and where we’ve slipped up and where we can improve as well as the importance of the match on 26 February.” “It seems to me that the important thing is not the number of points we have but our position in the table on 13 May, whether we ahead of or behind Juventus. The head to head will be big but what counts is the end result. This year we’ve picked up more points against the small teams and less against the big, last year it was the opposite. I don’t know if we’ll be back on top if we win the next three games. We have to take it one game at a time.”
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MILAN - La Lega has communicated the dates of the games to be replayed due to extreme weather conditions:Wednesday 15 February ATALANTA-GENOA (18.30)Wednesday 15 February PARMA-JUVENTUS (18.30) Tuesday 21 February BOLOGNA-FIORENTINA (18.30)Wednesday 22 February SIENA-CATANIA (18.30) The remainder of Catania-Roma, interupted with 20 minutes left to play due to flash floods, will be played on Wednesday 8 Frebruary at 20.00 and not on Tuesday 7 as was previously announced.  
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MILAN - It's the eve of Milan-Napoli which kicks off tomorrow at 15.00.The team will train today at the same time. Check the site later for a breakdown of what the team did.
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After a loss last time out, the Rossoneri will be keen to get back to winning ways against Walter Mazzari's men. Adam Bate is backing the home side to be ahead at the break
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The Turin giants are frontrunners in the race for Serie A for the first time since Calciopoli but the league leaders' coach wants to downplay the surrounding media hype
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The Swede looked odds on to seal our latest Goal Show competition until the Bosnia beat the former Barcelona man to post
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Massimiliano Allegri's men will be looking to bounce back from their midweek defeat to Lazio when they welcome the southern Italian outfit to San Siro on Sunday
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The Argentine defender has dismissed the notion that Napoli are in crisis, while stating that the team is unbeatable when they play at their best
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I am previewing a game that may or may not happen, just so you are aware. At this point weather outlook is grim, with the game being moved from a 245 EST start time to a 9 EST start time. Until we know for sure we press on with business as usual…and business is not good…

So much has been made this season about Milan’s inability to beat the top sides in the Table, in fact almost as much has been made about Napoli’s inability to beat the weak sides in the Table. So really on the outset things are NOT looking up for Milan. We know how difficult the month is, two games a week for four weeks, and the injuries are not easy to contend with, but this is not the time for excuses. Both teams enter this match with a simple directive: must win.

The loss to Lazio difficult, in fact it left many wondering what could have been differently, but as we discussed in the comments, few options truly existed. We know in some way shape or form the defense will remain the same, which is a positive, Abbiati will remain in net and Zlatan and Nocerino will be in the starting eleven. The rest is up for debate. Against Lazio we saw an attack minded front three who often dropped deep but didn’t connect as well as one would have thought with the midfield. It didn’t help that Zlatan was a bit out of form, and in turn caused problems for his teammates, but this is not a surprise. February is often unkind to the big Swede, and no coincidence that is usually the time of his big CL failures? If Milan are to right the ship he needs to break the February slump and at least create if he can’t finish. He is a fixture in the lineup but who does he pair with? Binho continues to work but he wasn’t the live wire that El Shaarawi was, and while Seedorf can slow things down to a painful halt his qualities could be useful in the right scenario this match, so here it goes:

Abbiati; Abate, Mexes, Silva, Mesbah; Urby, Ambro, Nocerino; Clarence; Zlatan, El Shaarawi

Van Bommel and Ambro need to be rotated, not played together so it starts this week. Same can be said of Nesta, Silva and Mexes, avoiding more than two games in a row for any of them. Abate, Mesbah, and Nocerino risk being worn out, but at this point you need the points here and now. Clarence can be lethal, or detrimental, I guess 45 minutes should be enough time to decide that, if not bring on Binho or Maxi. This one is a must win and needs to be wrapped up as soon as possible.

Record in the Month of Hell: 0W 1L 0D

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MILANO - Mark Van Bommel spoke to the Milan Channel ahead of Sunday's match against Napoli. "This year, like last year, Milan-Napoli is a key game for the title. After having lost against lazio, we don't want to drop any more points. We have Napoli now and then Juventus, then Udinese and then Juventus again in the league. I'd say this is the most important part of the season and I want to score as well. We're not happy unless we win becasue we know that Juventus are getting away from us. The reaction inside the changing room was imortant and it'll be important to learn from the loss in order to get back winning."  
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MILAN - According to the official club website, Walter Mazzarri's team trained at the Castelvolturno sports centre this afternoon. The team will leave for Milan tomorrow afternoon. 
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The versatile Italy international is refusing to underestimate the threat posed by Udinese and Inter but he feels that his side and AC Milan are the clear frontrunners
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MILAN – Along with Cesena-Catani, La Lega has decided to postpone Roma-Inter as well. The game was supposed to have been played at 15.00 but snow in the capital has seen the game put off.
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MILAN – Last season Zlatan Ibrahimovic scored against Napoli in both games while Edinson Cavani failed to find the back of the net against the Rossoneri. The season, the South American is in the lead thanks to his hat-trick in Naples.Meanwhile, Panini Digital has released the numbers regarding the two forwards: Shots on target: Ibrahimovic 71 – Cavani 62; Goals: Ibrahimovic 15 – Cavani 12. Ibra has supplied 52 assists, 4 of which led to goals.
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MILAN – There are six players for Milan and Napoli who have seen the most game time: MILAN: Thiago Silva 1749 minutes played in the league, Nocerino 1707, Abate 1607. NAPOLI: De Sanctis 1997 minutes, Cavani 1664, Campagnaro 1628
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MILAN - Nicola Rizzoli will referee Milan-Napoli. He’ll be assisted by Fabiano Preti and Gianluca Cariolato. Andrea Romeo will be the fourth man. It’ll be Rizzoli’s 139th game in Italy’s top flight. His precedents with Milan are 15 wins, 3 draws and 9 losses. With Napoli; 5 wins, 8 draws and 5 losses.
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(IN THE PHOTO: Abate, El Shaarawy, Bonera and Van Bommel during the warm up)MILANELLO – No snow, but there was plenty of cold waiting for coach Allegri’s team at the Milanello sports centre where the team started work at 12 on the central pitch. After a good quarter of an hour’s warm up with the ball at their feet on the central pitch, the team worked on their tactics ahead of Sunday afternoon’s match against Napoli. First of all the team played a full 11-a-side game with a couple of the Primavera players using the whole pitch.  The team then started using half the pitch with keepers Abbiati and Amelia. At the end of the session, Mesbah, Abate and Mai Lopez spent some time practicing their crosses. Besides the long term injuries, both Alessandro Nesta and Filippo Inzaghi both worked in the gym. Mathieu Flamini on the other hand is still working n his return. Today he followed his personalized training program doing some work with the ball on the outside pitches. Tomorrow’s training session, the last before Sunday is scheduled for 15.00 with Massimiliano Allegri holding his press conference beforehand. 
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MILAN - Mark Van Bommel on Wednesday evening in Rome reached 500 presences in European football. A real football legend with a career spanning twenty years of triumphs. The Dutchman has won 8 league titles: 4 in Holland with PSV, 2 in germany with Bayern Munich, 1 in Spain with Barcelona and of course last season with the Rossoneri. He’s also won another 10 titles between cups, super cups as well as the Champions League in 2006 with Barcelona not to mention the world cup final in 2010 between Holland and Spain. The General is one this sport’s true greats.  1992/93 Fortuna Sittard - 1 presences - 1 goal1993/94 Fortuna Sittard - 2 presences - 13 goals1994/95 Fortuna Sittard - 31 presences - 7 goals1995/96 Fortuna Sittard - 27 presences1996/97 Fortuna Sittard - 19 presences1997/98 Fortuna Sittard - 31 presences - 1 goal1998/99 Fortuna Sittard - 31 presences - 5 goals1999/00 PSV Eindhoven - 33 presences - 6 goals2000/01 PSV Eindhoven - 32 presences - 8 goals2001/02 PSV Eindhoven - 23 presences - 4 goals2002/03 PSV Eindhoven - 28 presences - 9 goals2003/04 PSV Eindhoven - 23 presences - 6 goals2004/05 PSV Eindhoven - 30 presences - 14 gol2005/06 Barcelona - 24 presences - 2 goals2006/07 Bayern Monaco - 29 presences - 2 goals2007/08 Bayern Monaco - 27 presences - 2 goals2008/09 Bayern Monaco - 29 presences - 2 goals2009/10 Bayern Monaco - 25 presences - 1 goal2010/11 Bayern Monaco - 13 presencesJanuary 2011 - Milan - 14 presences2011/2012 - Milan - 17 presences 500 GAMES AND 73 GOALS 
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