AC Milan general spiel 2.0

[San Paolo]

yeah, I saw it when it was live and wanted to watch it back again but couldn't find it. Mario did the right thing though.

[RomaShield27]

Yeh. Here it is (or part of it, there was a little more at end). He actually comes across as a very well mannered young gent.

[red]

Not too tough to come across as well-mannered and reasonable when competing with The Sun.

[vtec]

the pimp is gone. long live the pimp

[San Paolo]

Balotelli. instant hero.

[RomaShield27]

As well as goals, it looks as if Berlusconi bought Balotelli for votes
/ Friday, February 1, 2013

PADDY AGNEW in Rome

For a majority of Italian observers this week, the big question surrounding the much reported €20 million transfer of Mario Balotelli from Manchester City to AC Milan concerned votes, not goals. Could the purchase of this obviously explosive (in every sense) talent really win over 400,000 votes for the centre-right coalition led by the irrepressible, 76-year-old former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi, who, of course, just happens to be the owner of AC Milan?

In the short term, there is no doubt whatsoever that the Balotelli transfer has been a brilliant publicity coup, making the prime-time news bulletins and the newspaper front pages for three days in a row, right in the middle of a red-hot general election campaign. In football terms, this is clearly a huge moment for the Italian game, with populist sentiment ready to perceive this transfer as the return of a talented prodigal son, following two years of cultural misunderstanding in the land of the Anglo-Saxon.

Football professionals know that this is not quite the case. Those who have worked with Balotelli know all too well that, on occasions, he can make the Mad Hatter seem like an understated chartered accountant.

However, everybody knows that the “boy” can play and it is in that context that he been greeted like a returning hero.

Riot gear
On Wednesday, Milan fans followed his every move back on Italian soil, greeting him when he arrived at the airport, when he then went to a nearby health clinic for his medical check and, finally, when he went to the Giannino restaurant in downtown Milan for dinner with AC Milan managing director Adriano Galliani and team coach Massimiliano Allegri. So enthusiastic was the 400 strong gathering of fans outside the restaurant that police had to don riot gear and restore some peace after “Balo” had slipped in by a side entrance.

By yesterday, sports daily Gazzetta Dello Sport was selling T-shirts reproducing Wednesday’s front page of the paper, totally dominated by a picture of Balotelli and bearing the headline “Balo Is Back”. Gazzetta even carried a picture of the “good luck”, AC Milan biro pen which Balotelli used to formally sign his new contract yesterday.

All of this might sound like just another big football transfer story. Yet for those of us who have monitored Mr Berlusconi’s 20-year long, complex intertwining of football and politics, this is clearly about more than football. Remember, Berlusconi is the politician who in 1994 “took to the field” of politics with a brand new party called “Forza Italia” (literally Up Italy), an expression that until then had only been used when cheering on national teams.

Political appeal
The original Forza Italia deputies were referred to as “Azzurri”, a term that had previously only referred to national team players. Perhaps the most emphatic example of Berlusconi’s understanding of the role of football success in his political appeal came during that 1994 election campaign. In those far-off days of single seat constituencies, he taunted his centre-left rival in the Roma I constituency, the late distinguished economist, Luigi Spaventa, with the words: “Before running against me, go and win yourself two Champions Cups.”

As for Mario Balotelli, the narrative is very clear. After years when he appeared to pay little or no attention to his club, rarely attending either training or games, Berlusconi late last autumn suddenly got active again on the AC Milan front. Not only did he resurface for Serie A or Champions League games at the San Siro but he also began to make regular Saturday morning visits to the club’s Milanello training ground.

For Berlusconi, Milanello is not just an alma mater but it also represents a very loyal and safe political constituency. Nowhere else does he so clearly portray himself as a “winner”. Remember at his first meeting with Milan players back in 1986, just after he had bought the club, he told then that he was “not accustomed to finishing second”.

Thus given Milan’s current league standing of fifth, it was time to put some money back on the table, hire a big name and get the “winning” show back on the road. If that helps win matches, good. If it helps win votes, even better. In a week, too, when he had been bitterly attacked for pro-Mussolini comments made on Holocaust Memorial day, what better stroke than to hire a brilliant, black Italian. Who says I’m racist now?

[Lombardiamia]

Did anyone have any doubts why Balotelli was bought now? Votes are far more important than anything and he does this regularly.

[RomaShield27]

By Eurosport | Pitchside Europe / http://uk.eurosport.yahoo.com/blogs/pit ... 35465.html

Do spare a thought for Giampaolo Pazzini. After scoring twice in a 2-1 win against Bologna on January 20, 2013, the Milan striker was promised by chief executive Adriano Galliani that there were no plans to bring in a rival in the transfer window. One can only imagine then his reaction to La Gazzetta dello Sport's front page last Wednesday, which declared that "Balo is back," the Photoshopped red of his 'crest' haircut signifying he'd joined Milan from Manchester City.

Conscious that he hadn't kept his word, Galliani picked up the phone to call Pazzini. He reassured Milan's second top scorer this season with 10 goals that he was still an important player for the team. At least, he'd get to play against Barcelona later this month with Balotelli cup-tied in the Champions League.

There was always Sunday night, too, right? Because amid the clamour for Balotelli to make his debut in a red and black shirt on Udinese's visit to San Siro, initial tests at MilanLab had revealed that he was lacking match fitness. After all, he hadn't played a full competitive 90 minutes since City's 2-0 win at Wigan on November 28. Coach Massimiliano Allegri would leave him on the bench. Pazzini would start.

That was the plan. Only it was to go awry in the warm-up. Pazzini pulled a muscle. He was out. Balotelli was in. And the rest, they say, is history.
A pair of goals on his debut, including a controversially awarded penalty in added-time, which Balotelli dispatched with the coolness you'd expect of a player who had never missed from the spot in 11 previous attempts for Inter, City and Italy, sealed a precious 2-1 win.
It was a historic moment. Only five other Milan players - Angelo Bollano in 1941, Renzo Burini in 1948, Juan Alberto Schiaffino in 1954, Giancarlo Danova in 1958 and Dejan Savicevic in 1992 - have ever scored a brace on their first appearance for the club. Balotelli had somehow met if not exceeded expectation.The hype, for now, was justified.

President Silvio Berlusconi revealed he hadn't been able to get to sleep after watching his new signing's goals. Balotelli couldn't either, reportedly paying a visit to his favourite Milan night spot, Old Fashion, to see a friend who does the club's PR before heading back to Brescia and the family home.

Why wouldn't you stay awake when, as Galliani had said last Wednesday on the tarmac at Malpensa where Balotelli had just disembarked a private jet from Manchester, this was a "dream come true." "I'd wanted to play for Milan for a long time," Balotelli smiled, a red and black scarf draped around his neck. "Obviously I played for other teams and I couldn't come. But when there was the chance, I ran."

The nine-year-old Balotelli, we're told, celebrated when Milan won the Scudetto under Alberto Zaccheroni in 1999. While on a hospital visit to perk up some sick children a decade later, Balotelli, by then at Inter, was asked who he supported and replied: "Milan. Didn't you know?" On one occasion he turned up to training at Inter's Appiano Gentile training ground wearing a pair of red and black socks. Marco Materazzi took the scissors to them. And on more than one occasion, he'd be seen at San Siro as a spectator when Milan were playing.

Following all this, Valerio Staffelli, the presenter of satirical show Striscia la Notizia, famously tracked Balotelli down to a cafe in 2010. It was just a few days after Inter had played Barcelona and he'd caused outrage by throwing his blue and black shirt to the ground. Staffelli presented him with a red and black one instead with his name and number on the back. Balotelli refused to wear it at first but then, thinking that the cameras had been switched off, pulled it on.
Even though Milan thought they'd maybe missed their only chance to get him when they were beaten to his signature by Inter in 2006 despite their having a special relationship with his then club Lumezzane to whom they had loaned a number of players including the now Juventus striker Alessandro Matri, there was still a certain inevitability that Balotelli's wish "that one day I will play for Milan" would be realised.
That it was, however, shouldn't be taken for granted. As Galliani insisted at the player's unveiling at San Siro last Friday, he absolutely meant it when he said there was a 99.5 per cent chance the move wouldn't happen. He wasn't being superstitious. "It was one of the most complicated negotiations of my life," Galliani said.
On the one hand, Balotelli was supposedly far too expensive. His agent Mino Raiola had said: "No Italian club can afford him. Balotelli is as valuable as the Mona Lisa. And City have been very clear - they don't want to sell." On the other, he wasn't wanted by Milan's owner. Berlusconi had called Balotelli "a rotten apple", a comment for which he later apologised, warning that "if you put him in a group then he will also poison the others."

Things would change, however, and dramatically so. Galliani, with a little help from Raiola, who had helped him broker Robinho's transfer from the Etihad to San Siro, got City to slash their asking price for Balotelli from €37m to €20m. Berlusconi, running for office yet again ahead of a general election which falls on the weekend of the Milan derby, saw an opportunity too.

Il Corriere della Sera claimed that, as part of his political strategy, Berlusconi had commissioned a poll to show the impact on his support after Milan sold Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Thiago Silva to Paris Saint-Germain. They revealed he risked losing 20-25 per cent of the Milan fans who had previously backed his Popolo della Liberta party at the ballot box, a figure that apparently translates to at least half a million votes. Buying Balotelli, the cynics, including the Inter president Massimo Moratti said, and Berlusconi denied, was an attempt to win them back.

It was of course a coup in so many ways. Raiola, a man not averse to hyperbole, claimed that by leaving City and joining Milan, Balotelli had made "the value of the Premiershit diminish by 50 per cent and that of Serie A rise by 50 per cent."

There's self-interest in that and it goes without saying that it should be taken with more than a pinch salt. Maybe a camouflage Bentley full. Yet Balotelli's homecoming is especially welcome in light of so many star players leaving Italy, from Ibrahimovic in the summer to Wesley Sneijder in the winter. His return means it will hopefully still grab the attention of a wider audience, although reports of Balotelli's No.45 shirt selling at a rate of 40 per hour were checked in a certain respect by the sight of San Siro still being only half full for his debut.

Interest in how this turns out, however, is, as you'd expect, the focus of discussion in Italy at the moment and will be for some time to come. The €20m question everyone wants answering is of course the same as always: will Balotelli realise his potential and become the world-class player he threatened to be after that barnstorming performance against Germany at Euro 2012?

Speaking to La Gazzetta dello Sport last week, a sad-to-say-goodbye Roberto Mancini reiterated his belief that "[Mario] can get to the levels of people like Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo." As one columnist argued though, "at Balotelli's age [22], Messi had already won a Ballon d'Or. In August, Mario will turn 23, the age that Cristiano Ronaldo was when he won his Ballon d'Or."

To some, even though he's still so young, this is his last chance. To others this is his first opportunity. Because unlike at Inter when he was behind Ibrahimovic, then Diego Milito and Samuel Eto'o in the pecking order and at City when he had Carlos Tevez, Edin Dzeko and Sergio Aguero ahead of him, at Milan, by contrast, Balotelli is for once the leading man, complementing rather than competing with M'Baye Niang and, in particular, current top scorer Stephan El Shaarawy in a front line which has an average age of just 20.

It's hoped that with this responsibility and the greater playing time, football's "Peter Pan" will finally grow up. As Prandelli says, "it all depends on him." No one is more thrilled than the Italy coach that Balotelli is back in Serie A, not least because back in November he put him together with El Shaarawy up front in a friendly against France in Parma. That partnership is now consolidated at club level and the understanding between them, touch wood, will flourish to the benefit of the Azzurri ahead of the 2014 World Cup in Brazil.

Balotelli and El Shaarawy will start in Wednesday's friendly with the Netherlands in Amsterdam before returning to Milan who have now won eight of their last 10 games in Serie A, moving up to fifth place in the table level with Inter, who they trailed by as many as 11 points back in October.

Occupying the third and final Champions League spot, Lazio who've suffered back-to-back defeats and will be without top scorer Miroslav Klose for the next two months after he picked up an injury, are only three points ahead of them. Lazio losing a striker and Milan gaining one might prove the difference. Still it's not as though scoring goals has been their problem this season, it's been keeping them out in the absence of Alessandro Nesta and Thiago Silva.

Anyway, a €300k bonus is said to have been included in Balotelli's contract should he help the club qualify for the Champions League once again, something that seemed impossible not so long ago. Crucial to that could be the derby against former club Inter on February 24. When asked if he would celebrate a goal, Balotelli replied, "sure", although not, it must be said, with any malice. Even so, imagine that. God forbid it should come under the Curva Nord. Pencil the date in your diary. It certainly promises to be one of the events of the season.
James Horncastle

[p_maldini_3]

much needed win against parma.

in the first half, we were completely outplayed in the midfield. any team that presses us will always put us on the back foot, and parma were running rings around us. muntari looked really short on match-fitness and he was making mistakes everywhere. nocerino doesn't contribute much in terms of midfield possession, so it was left to montolivo to pull the strings, and while he did great in the second half he was plagued down with his responsibilities for most of the match. amauri did a good job of pulling yepes out of position frequently but luckily parma weren't able to capitalize. boateng's first accurate cross of the match was turned in fortuitously for the own goal, can't say it was deserved from the run of play.

we started much better in the second half, parma dropped their tempo and we were able to start dictating the game more, but parma were really well organized and feisty so we could barely get a sniff in front of goal. balotelli and niang started switching positions frequently and that helped confuse the parma defenders, but we could barely break parma down unless it was a counter-attack.

balotelli had a great free kick, cherry on the top for his game, he played better than most and did what he was asked. parma were trying to get under his skin but he did a good job of not retaliating to any of the provocations.

hard to see us being any threat to barca, the way parma and cagliari ran circles around our midfield 3 in the past 2 games makes me dread how barca will be. allegri had a good game-plan last season, but he also had better players. i just hope that it is not a wash-out, if we can prevent barca from scoring in the san siro we could give it a go in the return leg. but as long as it's a fair playing field with barca not getting erroneous and benevolent calls from the officials, i'll be satisfied with some proper effort.

[red]

Great stuff from Milan there - you just can't play Barca much better than that.

There were periods where Milan were pinned back on the edge of their own box, but for a fair chunk of the second half they managed to step up and have a pretty good level of control over the game and retain the ball. That allowed some of their players a bit of a rest which meant they were able to keep going through to the end unlike a lot of teams who play Barca (including Milan last season) who were dead at 75 mins.

Key thing was that everything, whether it was sitting deep or stepping up, was done as a unit, so there was never any space left in dangerous areas that Barca could exploit.

That said, I thought Barca were crap. What is the point of having Alba and Alves in your team if you aren't going to have them make penetrating runs from deep to try and get down the side or in behind a packed defence? Barca didn't stretch the game wide or long, so it was comparatively easy for Milan to remain compact. Can't remember a game where Messi was involved so little since Zanetti dominated him a few years back.

[p_maldini_3]

[RomaShield27]

Great win, fair play to Milan, great performance.



/ Thursday, February 21, 2013 / SID LOWE at the San Siro

AC Milan 2 Barcelona 0: A frustrating and already damaging night for Barcelona turned into a disastrous one when Stephan El Shaarawy flicked up the ball in the final minutes and dinked a perfect assist into the path of Sulley Muntari, who guided the ball into the bottom corner of Victor Valdes’ net. It was the second shot that had hit the very same spot, after Kevin-Prince Boateng had opened the scoring after 56 minutes, and it leaves a largely impotent Barcelona with a huge task in the second leg.

It leaves Milan in a position as perfect as it appeared implausible. A huge banner had been unfurled over the south stand before this game: “We are history,” it declared. Milan may not be what they were but they deserved their 2-0 victory and, as the noise roared round San Siro, this felt like a historic night.

For the first time in 15 games Lionel Messi did not score; for the 10th time in a row Barcelona did concede – not once but twice. Those domestic warnings were real and for the Catalans, this was reminiscent of a recent history they would prefer to forget.

There were memories of Chelsea and there will be talk once again of Chelsea and of Barcelona’s Plan B. It was not just that Barcelona did not score; it was that they rarely looked like scoring. Much had been made about how Milan would stop a side that have scored 80 league goals this season and a player, Messi, who alone had scored 47 of them. Bojan Krikic had joked that the only way was for three or four Catalans to wake up with stomach ache.

Collective trap

Manager Massimiliano Allegri laid a more collective trap. He had warned as much, too. Before the game Allegri had said: “Barcelona have 65 per cent of the possession; we have to make sure that it is sterile possession.” His prediction was remarkably accurate and so was the set-up: just before the half-time whistle went, the possession stats showed: Milan 34 per cent, Barcelona 66 per cent. And yet Barcelona had created little. Virtually all of the opening 45 minutes were spent in the Milan half and much of it in a 20-metre strip on the edge of their area, squeezed into tight spaces.

At times Barcelona’s touch was superb but it allowed them to evade challenges and keep the ball, rather than evade opponents and create chances. As the two teams concertinaed, and Messi drifted to a territory on the right where he started his career but which he rarely occupies these days, and looked to come inside from there, and it was Dani Alves who had the task of skirting the wall of bodies. He spent the game dashing from deep, beyond the Milan defence and offering the chance of the diagonal ball behind them. Few were played and fewer still found him. But it felt as if he might be the key.

That went for both sides. Alves tried to create a space that did not really exist behind the Milan defence by running beyond them or pulling them wider – and it was a cross of his that should have drawn a penalty for Barcelona when Philippe Mexes handled.

Greatest threat

That the referee did not see it was understandable; that the goal-line official failed to spot it was not. In making those runs, and he made them constantly, Alves departed a space that did occasionally open up for Milan. El Shaarawy, always expected to be the Italians’ greatest threat, lurked waiting to take advantage.

Milan got the first goal 10 minutes into the second half. It came from a free-kick 25 metres out. The ball was played short and, it seemed, rather loosely towards Riccardo Montolivo. He stretched to hit it and his shot flew off Jordi Alba and seemingly against the hand of Cristian Zapata, dropping for Boateng. He swung and guided the ball, left-footed, into Valdes’ bottom left corner. Barcelona reacted by replacing Cesc Fabregas with Alexis Sanchez but far from changing the pattern of the game, it merely entrenched it.

Messi and Xavi put free-kicks over the bar; Christian Abbiati hardly had to move for them; he rarely had to move all night. And then, at the other end, Muntari ended it in style.



Attendance: 75,000
Referee: Craig Thomson (Scotland).
© 2013 Guardian Service

-----------

[vtec]

al shipoopie

[maro]

Sacchi: 'Ma quale partita perfetta. Il Milan una volta era padrone del gioco'
21 febbraio alle 16:30
Il Milan supera il Barcellona degli extraterrestri per 2-0 e l'ambiente rossonero è al settimo cielo. "Prova superba", esulta il presidente Silvio Berlusconi; "Una delle nostre grandissime partite di coppa", gli fa eco l'ad Adriano Galliani.

Ma c'è una voce, nel 'mondo Milan', che esce fuori dal coro. Si tratta del grande ex rossonero Arrigo Sacchi, allenatore del Milan due volte campione euro-mondiale nel 1989 e 1990, ora commentatore televisivo. L'ex ct della Nazionale spiega a Radio Kiss Kiss: "Quella del Milan contro il Barcellona non è stata una partita perfetta. La prestazione del Milan è stata buona agonisticamente ed organizzativamente in difesa con ottime ripartenze. Allegri è stato molto bravo a giocare in questo contesto, ha giocato la partita che poteva e doveva fare in questo contesto. Mettiamola così: sono stati bravissimi a centrare un sogno".

"Il Milan però era abituato ad essere padrone del gioco e del campo. Il risultato di ieri potrebbe aprire delle prospettive importanti, ma se si crede che sia giunti ad un punto di arrivo allora si è fuori strada", conclude l'ex mister di Fusignano.

[p_maldini_3]

this was a crazy game, completely unexpected.

i've given allegri a hard time in the past, but the sign of a good coach is when he can make a team play better than their parts, and it is exactly how we played on wednesday.

i'm just trying to figure out where boateng came from, we have'nt seen a performance like that from him since his first season with us, if he can show that consistently, he would greatly improve our expectations for this team.

this tie isn't over, and milan is the best at throwing away leads, but i have no doubt that we can score an away goal that can ultimately kill off those thespian ass lickers.

[p_maldini_3]

[red]

Milan's wingers certainly were prepared to track the runs.

But how often were they actually asked to track a real run that was threatening to break in behind the defence?

Forwards players, however willing they are, always have a defensive lapse in them, but you need to keep testing them. No point in just making one run, seeing it is tracked and thinking there is no point in trying that tactic again for the rest of the game.

Also, why weren't Alves or Alba willing to try and beat their man when in a one-on-one situation? It's not like Milan's wingers have fantastic tackling ability. I know the answer to this one: no Barca player is allowed to dribble with the ball other than Messi (and Iniesta occasionally).

So, when Messi is out of the game, Barca have no penetrating movement and no-one to try and beat their man one-on-one. That makes it extraordinarily difficult to beat a well organised defence. Add in the absence of a proper CF who can score from crosses and it's no wonder they struggle so much in these games.

[red]

But isn't it wonderful that they only know one way to play...

[red]

As well as Allegri did against Barca, I thought he cocked things right up tonight.

Milan, clearly, were absolutely dominant in the first half playing the 4-3-3 with the wingers starting wide and drifting inside to create space for the overlapping fullbacks. That was pinning Inter's wide players back and allowing Milan to expose the lack of athleticism in the Inter side by keeping the pitch pretty big.

In the second half, until Niang came on, Milan were basically playing 4-3-1-2. That offered far less movement, didn't stretch Inter out as much and allowed them to finally get some sort of foothold in the game. Milan also didn't press as aggressively as the did in the first half.

Why on earth did Allegri make the change when things were going so well for Milan in the first half?

Only thing I can think is that he didn't think Milan had the energy levels to keep playing the way they did in the first half after their game in midweek. Even then, I think he should have backed his side to be able to keep going as well as Inter since they also had a game in midweek and aren't anything like as fit a side as Milan.

[p_maldini_3]

i think it was the pressing that helped us dominate inter in the first half, as well as nagatomo being taken for a ride by el sharaawy. they fixed that after the half by switching zanetti to RB and he was able to play that zone much more effectively.

but we should've been up by 3 goals at the half, handanovic made some incredible saves, especially from balotelli's header off the corner. gab marcotti's gone so far to say that handanovic might be the best keeper in the world right now, he sure was based on the first half yesterday.

i don't think allegri's switch to a less aggressive style in the second half had to do with the energy levels, inter played a day later and theoretically should've 'tired' before we did especially with cassano on the field; i think in typical allegri fashion he just tried to close the game down and it bit us in the ass. it was 2 points lost rather than 1 gained.

allegri blows hot and cold for me, his lack of courage at times really costs us.