The Don goes with a Milanista Midfield
By: Gianfranco | October 15th, 2007-The Don’s Rossoneri midfield this weekend against Georgia paid big dividends. This was arguably the best and most offensive Azzuri game under the reign of the Don. Some fans are calling the game boring, but I think it was a testament to good possession football. Pirlo’s goal was a gift but Toni’s header should not have missed. Great goal from Grosso on his return to the Azzuri, and his play makes me wonder if if Zamba or Oddo should sit the bench for him. Oddo did play quite well though, and I am sure two of those three will be in action against Scotland. Barzagli and Pannucci did very little so things were sharp up front, congrats on another win. I just hope they can bury France in the process.
-Uncle Fester and company are denying any moves or offerings for their golden boy Kaka. Lampard and Drogba for Kaka is looking like a mighty fine deal at this point and time.
- The return of R99 is imminent, and not barring any midweek disasters he will be on the bench against Empoli, I have literally no excitement for this whatsoever, sorry.
-Maldini returned on Friday in a nil-nil draw with Atletico Bilbao, he hopes to play again this weekend against Empoli, only time will tell if he can manage. I no longer Il Capitano should only play in Europe, I know believe he should play whenever he can so that he and Nesta can hold down the line together, and I do not have to watch Bonera. I still can not gain any faith in him, I am trying.
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Comments
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The Milan mid was good??? Ambrosini was wrecthed. Sitting DeRossi for him is inexcuseable. Pirlo was off, but still pretty good. Gattuso played well, but we can’t expect him to generate any offsense. Milan mid = no creativity.
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United States
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bonera is a lot better than you make him out to be… imo, he is no nesta, but he does have potential and he definately is better than you make him out to be…
and kaka for lampard and drogba is in no way a good deal… never will be.. drogba may be awesome but he is 31 and i am just not that impressed with lampard in recent times.. he is a good player but with issues with his contract negotiations, he should not be that expensive..
the two of them for kaka would be the biggest rip-off for milan… and we all know that it is chelsea that get ripped of everytime…
besides, why are you so intent on selling kaka?
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ps. out of curiosity, if kaka was italian do you really think you would be ready to jump at any deal that takes him away from milan??
admittedly kaka plays awesome in cl most of the time and in serie a some of the time and i guess its okay to want more from him in serie a but how is it that you seem to have more patience with gila, who hasnt given us much in either competition yet, than with kaka?
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What game did you watch? GG was good, Pirlo was less than prime, but still decent, and Ambro was useless - because anyone could’ve taken Georgia off the ball, even David Pizarro. Only Pirlo has a prayer of sending in a decent pass or creating something offensively.
I’ll never watch another Azzurri game if I see the Milan midfield is playing. That midfield is so “anti-football” it isn’t even funny.
And Oddo was fucking brutal. He is just not good enough to get regular starting nods anymore. His best asset is knocking crosses off defenders shins, because if he can get one off clean, it usually winds up in the stands.
I’m not anti-Milan, but let’s call a spade a spade. Only Pirlo and Gattuso should be seeing starting spots anymore.
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given Bonera a break, he filled a big hole at the back when Nesta was out with injury last year. he’s young and still has a lot to learn but he’s done a pretty good job so far and with regular play time he would get better.
Anyway, that’s my two cents!
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yeah, that was oddo’s worst ever performance in a game.
he barely pushed up, and everytime he did his cross ended up behind the goal. it was so bad of a game by him that im definitely sure that donadoni gave him specific orders to stay back.
either that, or hes tired as hell, carlo usually subs him out at the end of our games, his fitness levels are lacking.
defensively, our midfield trio were impeccable. ambrosini and gattuso were ripping georgia a new a-hole almost twice a minute.
it wasnt a delight to watch offensively; surely our bland possession of the ball kept us in the game, but again, italy’s over reliance on pirlo can only go so far.
as they say in italy, if baggio was our prince, pirlo is our king!
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Man, After watching that match i think it was not such a bad thing that dida got banned because now kalac finally gets some pitch time and I think he did really well. Cant wait for more…
And yes bonera is a lot better than you make hm out to be. I’m sorry Gianfranco but you got it all rong this time. especially regarding the kaka transfer, what are you talking about, for one chelsea will never do the deal, two drogba mite be ok but i think lampard will handle terribly in the Serie A.
Also Why do you have such a negative view of ronaldo, sure he been a bit of a let down over the past few weeks because of injury but he is a good asset and i think he will be very helpfull in Milans recovery.Posted from
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yeah, but chris, versus better teams ambrosini is useful. de rossi and pirlo haven’t exactly gelled either for the azzurri when together. also, everyone bashes oddo, and even gianfranco wants to sit him, why? cause grosso had one good game? grosso has been brutal for his clubs going on two seasons, now. i ain’t ready to hand him back a starting job when zambrotta gets healthy on the basis of that game alone. it is frustrating that oddo hasn’t played consistently for the azzurri, but he is still more reliable than grosso at this point. i want to see grosso do something for lyon before i let him fully back into my good graces.
as for the kaka proposition, If we get over 100M pounds for him in the summer, and then actually reinvest that in some players like nasri or van der vaart, plus benzema, maybe rosina, a solid young defender, keeper, etc. then fine, i might see that argument, cause for that kind of money you can rebuild half a squad with good to very good players, and we have some weaknesses, but for lampard and drogba? no thanks, we wouldn’t get any better (we actually get a little worse), and we get older. neither of which sounds too appealing to me.
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Great point Jamie, i am glad you view the profit of the deal as valuable as I do. You could spend 25M each on about 4 very good young players…
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yeah, you could even milk chelsea for like 115M probably, and get 5 really good, though younger players, then at those positions you bought new players like at gk or defender or striker, you sell one at those positions, and then that can finance another couple of purchases, and voila, new and stronger squad, though i would be devastated to see kaka leave.
the problem is that berlusconi would take all the kaka money and spend it on a 28 year-old and even fatter than currently, ronaldinho. so i just would rather we keep kaka given berlusconi’s tendencies, lol.
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The big mad does love fat Brazilians…
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The Azzuri have always played a possession game its unfair to look at this team and say the game was boring, it was not boring in fact it was a class on technical possession football. Was it exciting, not really, is Italy ever really exciting…not really. This is a team that not even twenty years ago used to play nothing but counter attacking defensive football, now its a possession midfield, they are making progress. Don’t ask Brazil to play this style, and don’t ask Italy to play attacking football, its just not going to happen.
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We’re not asking for it against Germany, France or Brazil. We’re asking for a) any illusion that this team could possibly create their own goals, which they usually can’t (hello, Milan midfield), or b) any attacking life against freaking Georgia, Faroe Islands, Lithuania or any other craptastic teams the Azurri can’t put away. This is the same team that was a Gigi miracle away from drawing with a bunch of carpenters in the Faroes. The either can’t put the teams away they’re supposed to or get outplayed and squeak by with a lucky 3 or draw. It’s time to blow it up.
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The formation and lineup on Saturday was different than those other games, this team was better suited to create and hold, they did not finish which is a problem in Milan and in the Azzuri. The first half they had a ton of chances, I really believe it was one of the better games under The Don.
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italy’s biggest problem vs. georgia was in the final third. quagliarella and di natale did jack shit in their positions.
gattuso and ambrosini did well in winning balls back and passing it off to pirlo, but he had no forward passed because di natale and quagliarella weren’t mobile enough.
italy played some amazing football in the world cup, stats prove it too. we had the second highest goal per game ratio, the highest were the germans (on their home turf..).
lippi’s italy set the bar of the italian version of beautiful football; donadoni’s italy is still a little bit confused… (the front 3 atleast).
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The front 3, 2 or 1. The Don has gotten no conistency from his troops, I do not envy his job.
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Shehan I noticed you posted on the Roma blog in regards to Oddo’s bad game. Has the measure of a wingback being based solely on going forward? Oddo played a very good game defesnsively and as I have watched him and learned his style of play he can really focus and deny the ball as a defender, but also attack when needed. He just seemed more inclined to defend on Saturday which is fine by me. I went a bit overboard on Grosso, who after watching the game a second time, did very little other than have some good luck and timing to find himself on goal…
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people are leting club biases cme into this too much. yeah, oddo didn’t play his best, but grosso had a lackluster first half to go along with his abysmal so far, he scores a goal and all of a sudden we need to throw the bum oddo out who actually has been a good bright spot for milan, even though the club is on poor form. also, another milanista ambrosini has been one of the best offensive players, yes, offensive players for milan. people are acting like this guy is a total incompetent. yeah, he had a bad game, de rossi has had poor games next to pirlo also, with ambrosini, we know that is an anomaly, as normaly those 3 are fine together, with de rossi, we just don’t know (yes, you can say that a coach like lippi would see what the problem was and find a way to play those two together, as they are two of the best midfielders in serie a, well fine, maybe that’s the case, but lippi ain’t here unfortunately).
plus, midfield wasn’t even the main problem. quaglirella has lost all confidence and he can’t even beat georgian defenders one v one in open space, his passes go nowhere and his shots are much further off target than even the worst oddo cross. di natale als had a lackluster, which combined with some bad luck, like toni hitting the post, etc., led to a 2-0 scoreline. if the azzurri had players behind toni who were high on confidence and could do their job at a high level consistently, then it wouldn’t have been much of a problem, as the game would have been a 4-0 victory. plus, even if the stye hasn’t been that great, the results haven’t been that bad. i mean he could get 27 points in a tough group and not qualify, which let’ be honest, is shocking. if you qould have told me that you’d give italy 27 points and the tiebreaker over everyone but france, then i would have taken it in a heartbeat. unfortnately, it will probably end up that teams like portugal could qualfiy on 26 points in 14 matches, whereas italy could go home on 27 points in 12 matches. that is tough luck, but sometimes that is how it goes in qualifying. in almost every other group italy’s performance would qualify them if not win the group.
again, you can criticize the style, but then again, italy ain’t brazil, since when did fans get upset over winning “ugly.” hell, joga onita is more a myth anyway than fact, even brazil has had some teams grind out ugly results, a la 1994 and this past copa america. donadoni is not and was not the best man for the job, but given some of the injuries, tough breaks with calciopoli, being in the “group of death,” etc. he hasn’t done that badly, imho. nobody thought scotland would possibly get 28 points especially if they took only 1 point off italy, as that would have meant 27 out of the remaining 30 points, yet it looks like they will do just that barring a minor miracle tomorrow.
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* that was supposed to say
“grosso had a lackluster first half to go with his abysmal season so far.
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Why do you like Milan so much? You are Napolitano - root for them because they are better. The ONLY reason Italy won the World CUp in 06 wasn’t the “Milan Midfield” or the great Buffon. It was a Napolitano named Canavaro! And I hate France as much as they hate themselves but I want to beat them in the EURO finals with NO PK’s, No Zindane, and no head-butting. Forza Napoli - Forza Italia!
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United States
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