Cagliari 1 Milan 1

With improved results come increased expectations.  It is actually amazing how short term our memories can be.  It wasn't but a few weeks ago that every match was a measured amount of optimism.  Has the team exceeded expectations? It really depends where your expectations started!

When you look at a match like today's, stand alone, you think Milan can and should win.  Zeman's Cagliari is prone to giving up goals and Milan has scored more than a few.  More importantly the leaky defense at Milan seems to have calmed to a goal a game, but if the offense doesn't click then what.  That is what happened on this day and more importantly why this team still needs work and the expectation still needs to be lower then where the few results elevated them.

Apart from a spectacular goal from Giacomo Bonaventura and a great save from Cristian Abbiati late, the rest of this match was blah.  Following some "advice" from the Silvio Berlusconi, Filippo Inzaghi went back to Fernando Torres up top and the only changes from last match were Bonaventura for Andrea Poli and Adil Rami for Cristian Zapata.  The problem was the general flow of play was still not very good and while Milan was the aggressor on Sunday today the flanks didn't seem have the same bite and the attack was just plain sluggish.  Apart from Bonventura's cracker of a goal the five chances on net from Milan were average and while Nigel DeJong could have put Milan on top late on the effort was to little to late.

So what happens next?  I think expectations needs to go back to the previous levels of a team that is growing as a unit and that despite recent results there is still work to be done.  All is not lost and while 2 points out of the last 6 is not the best result considering the opponents this team needs to find some consistency on the pitch now that the personnel and tactics seemed to have steadied.