MILAN - The Ibra-Ro effect continues to heavily influence season ticket sales: especially impressive is the number of Champions League season tickets sold, another demonstration of the special meaning Europe has for Milan. Over 5000 Champions League season tickets were sold today for a total of 27.200 compared to last year's 22.103. In the meantime, during the course of the day, Rossoneri fans bought around 500 season tickets for the championship for a total of 24.492, compared to last season's final result of 25.780.
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MILAN – Kevin Prince Boateng and Rodney Strasser will be in action on Sunday, September 5, as the international matches get into full swing. The former’s team, Ghana, is in group 9 in the qualification phase of the Africa Cup of Nations 2012, and will visit Swaziland in Lobamba on Sunday. As for Strasser’s national team, Sierra Leone has a tough match ahead, as the team travels to Cairo to face Egypt on Sunday.
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MILAN – Venezuela will host Mario Yepes’ Colombia tonight, in a friendly match between two South American national teams.
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MILAN – Three Milan players will take to the field this evening, as qualification matches for Euro 2012 get under way: Andrea Pirlo at 20.30 CET in Tallinn, in Estonia-Italy (Group C), Zlatan Ibrahimovic at 20.00 CET in Stockholm, in Sweden-Hungary (Group E) and Sokratis Papastathopoulos at 20.45 CET in Athens, in Greece-Georgia (Group F).
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MILAN – The National Allievi team of Milan, coached by Cesare Beggi, after its great start to the 53rd edition of the Carlin’s Boys Cup, marked by victories against Slovenian side Luka Koper (3-0) and Imperia (11-0), lost to Sampdoria 2-1 yesterday evening. Nevertheless, the Rossoneri qualified for the semifinals as best runner-ups of the competition’s qualification stage. Milan will next face Juventus this evening, at 20.45 CET, at the Campo Pian di Poma in Sanremo. Read the original Article Here
Filippo Inzaghi believes Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Robinho will add weight and tip the Champions League scales in Milan's favour.
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Goal.com's Subhankar Mondal rounds up this week's best quotes from the players and managers, our writers and you the fans...
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Zlatan Ibrahimovic's agent Mino Raiola will continue to receive payments for a further four years due to an agreement with Barcelona.
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Thank god for Thursdays, I didn’t have a chance to polish this tactics piece for Tuesday so another day of the week that starts with a T is OK by me. Really didn’t mean to rhyme there, maybe the win on the weekend has made me delirious, who knows…
My focus here is to hash out what made Allegri’s 4-3-3 from Sunday so different than Leo’s last season, which was often times porous, slow, and ineffective.
I want to start by mapping out Leo’s 4-3-3, as you can see in the diagram the ten outfield players cover a lot of space but the deployment of the formation leaves gaping holes in very attractive attacking channels for opponents. There is by no means nothing wrong with this formation, but its success depends solely on the players ability to keep their shape and to be individually talented enough, both offensively and defensively, to cover their space and quickly join into the attack.
When Leo relied on Seedorf to play the LM or RM role, he often times ended up in advance of Pirlo, forcing his opposite midfielder to cover ground behind Pirlo. So our midfield line of three, which was supposed to cover the entire field horizontally now looked like a vertical line of three creating acres of space for opponents to attack into. Throw in some marauding fullbacks and you have classic recipe for disaster. Players caught high up in the attack and opponents countering with pace and numbers leaving CB’s of any caliber at a disadvantage.
Fast forward to Allegri’s 4-3-3, the deployment of the attack was more compact centrally, but the actual playing shape of the team was more compact up the pitch as well. In classic Arrigo Sacchi fashion, Allegri wanted to make the field smaller for both his team and the opponents. This was the cornerstone of Sacchi’s Milan and appears to be the foundation that Allegri is choosing to build his Milan on. Yes, this system also requires a certain amount of tactical know-how and the ability to play quickly and more directly to maximize the number of players in the attack, but Allegri proved that this Milan is in fact capable of all those keys to success. Yes, the opponent was Lecce and often times their central midfielder players dropped so far deep that Pirlo was left wide open with acres of space, but with Milan’s new look attack, team’s will be forced to respect Ronaldinho, Pato and Ibra making that kind of space available more often than not.
The idea of a compact formation is nothing new, but if done properly can be devastating to an opponent’s tactical game plan. By moving the defense further up the pitch the moment Milan loses possession it puts every player in close proximity to the opponent allowing them to pressure the ball easily; but more importantly gives the opponent little to no space to operate or move the ball forward. Of course a good play-maker and a pacy forward can break this lack of space with a well placed killer long ball, but asking a team to make a bit of magic is far better than giving up acres of space on the defensive side of the ball! Opponents will then be forced to result to short, quick, lateral passes in which our midfielders can pounce and keep the ball well away from our goal and more often than not in the attacking third. A simple yet effective game plan that when deployed properly can have excellent results as seen here!
Simply put Allegri just added a bit of tactical know how to a classic formation to get this team firing on all cylinders. Will the desire and intensity last the entire season? I can’t quite say, but considering the fact that on the bench we have Robinho to cover Pato and Ronaldinho. Flamini, Rino and Boateng to cover in the midfield finding fresh legs and ball winners should not be a problem. If you don’t want to pressure the ball and fight for the cause, there is someone else waiting to take your place young or old! Add in the fact that Milan is playing with a new found directness towards goal and a speed I have not seen them play with since I was a child, the future looks a bit brighter than first thought.
FYI: There won’t be any updates until Monday or Tuesday. I am traveling to Cape Cod for a preseason soccer tournament which will make it very hard to post and the lack of news with the International break will make it all the worse. So I will leave you to your own devices, God help us all! If I can get something together before I leave it will post on the weekend.
MILAN - Around 600 season tickets for Serie A have been sold today, for a total of around 24.000, compared to last season 25.720. As for the Champions League, Rossoneri fans have bought around 22.000 season tickets so far, compared to last season's total of 14.064.
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MILAN – The following coaches took part in the meeting in Nyon: Massimiliano Allegri (AC Milan), Carlo Ancelotti (Chelsea), Didier Deschamps (Olympique Marseille), Sir Alex Ferguson (Manchester United), Jean Fernandez (Auxerre), Jesualdo Ferreira (Málaga), Thorsten Fink (Basel), Josep Guardiola (Barcelona), Roy Hodgson (Liverpool), Jorge Jesus (Benfica), Martin Jol (Ajax), Felix Magath (Schalke 04), José Mourinho (Real Madrid), Nikos Nioplias (Panathinaikos), Claude Puel (Olympique Lyon), Claudio Ranieri (Roma) e Thomas Schaaf (Werder Bremen).
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MILAN – UEFA’s official website, uefa.com, reported that the coaches of the most important European clubs favour the experiments UEFA intends to introduce the next two seasons. The trainers expressed their opinion on the occasion of the UEFA Elite Club Coaches Forum, a reunion between UEFA representatives and trainers to discuss and analyze proposals drawn up for the development of the game. The experiment, first applied in last season’s UEFA Europa League, means the presence of an additional assistant at each goal whose task is to help the referee’s work by paying close attention to events inside the penalty area, such as shoves on set pieces or doubts regarding the ball crossing the line.
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MILAN – After the traditional summer break, Superleague Formula by Sonangoal will be back next weekend, at the circuit of Adria, in the heart of Polesine. It will be an exciting weekend, as the five leading teams will all try to take the lead before the final rush. Click qui!
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Milan's Clarence Seedorf was pleased after the draw for the Champions League Group G - with Real Madrid, Ajax, and Auxerre...
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MILAN – Roma president Rossella Sensi’s first words at the presentation of Marco Borriello were dedicated to Milan: "I must thank most of all president Berlusconi and Adriano Galliani, who once again demonstrated to be men of integrity by keeping their word. I’m very grateful for this.” Read the original Article Here
MILAN – A sea of friends! And all of them are Rossoneri! The number of Milan fans on Facebook reached one million, when Adriano Galliani started negotiations for Ibrahimovic in Barcelona, on Wednesday, August 25. Today, we reached number one million and fifty thousand… Milan’s Facebook page is the most popular among all the clubs of Serie A: click here!
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I want to start by mapping out Leo’s 4-3-3, as you can see in the diagram the ten outfield players cover a lot of space but the deployment of the formation leaves gaping holes in very attractive attacking channels for opponents. There is by no means nothing wrong with this formation, but its success depends solely on the players ability to keep their shape and to be individually talented enough, both offensively and defensively, to cover their space and quickly join into the attack.
Fast forward to Allegri’s 4-3-3, the deployment of the attack was more compact centrally, but the actual playing shape of the team was more compact up the pitch as well. In classic Arrigo Sacchi fashion, Allegri wanted to make the field smaller for both his team and the opponents. This was the cornerstone of Sacchi’s Milan and appears to be the foundation that Allegri is choosing to build his Milan on. Yes, this system also requires a certain amount of tactical know-how and the ability to play quickly and more directly to maximize the number of players in the attack, but Allegri proved that this Milan is in fact capable of all those keys to success. Yes, the opponent was Lecce and often times their central midfielder players dropped so far deep that Pirlo was left wide open with acres of space, but with Milan’s new look attack, team’s will be forced to respect Ronaldinho, Pato and Ibra making that kind of space available more often than not.
