A few nights ago, while I was running a training session for one of the teams I coach, one of my players was wearing a Kaka jersey; I couldn’t help but smile and asked the player about the shirt. He jokingly laughed and said I used to like him when he played for Milan, but not anymore, as we joked it got me thinking, what could have been if Kaka stayed, and how would the squad look today? Here is my answer, and forgive my hypothesizing, it is after all a speculative guess!
First and foremost, if Kaka was still around, I am almost one hundred percent
positive Ronaldinho would not be. The two never seemed to gel on the pitch, and often times looked to at odds instead of at peace. If Kaka was still on the books, Dinho would not have been given the early season chance and would probably be playing somewhere else right now. Carletto will have still gone to Chelsea, and I have a sneaking suspicion/hope he would have taken Pirlo with him. The optimist in me would like to think that instead of money for Pirlo, Milan would have tried to pry away Jon Obi Mikel,or at least Ballack, if not bring in a midfield replacement at this point I would even gladly leave that player up to you! Leo would still be the Coach, and the formation would be 4-3-3 and I would actually leave many of the changes exactly the same except one. So here is the lineup:
Abbiati, De Silvestri/Cissokho/Antonini, Nesta, Silva, Antonini/Cissokho Mikel/Flamini/Midfielder of Your Choice, Ambro, Kaka, Borri, Pato
Notice I added in a RB, again the optimist in me can’t help but think we could have done one simple thing right!! If you then consider the bench, even including KJH, you would have the Dutchmen, Rino, Zambro, Oddo, Pippo, Clarence, Janks, Gooch, and Kaladze…if you don’t think Milan would have spent 15M on the Orange stiff without selling Kaka then you keep Paloschi on the books and this team doesn’t look half bad now does it!?
Oh what could have been…