AC Milan general spiel 2.0

[p_maldini_3]

Big fish in small pond attitude. He has everything to gain and to lose now.

[Bagg10]

lol

[San Paolo]

Adil Rami, the French Thiago SIlva.

[San Paolo]

Boban was pretty scathing on Milan last night "I saw a team in total confusion in the field who did not seem to understand anything"

[p_maldini_3]

it's hard to disagree with boban. seedorf has a lot to change, primarily getting the outside forwards to work harder to support the team. all 3 goals we gave up came from the central midfielders not being able to do their jobs, (free shot for inler, free pass for inler to pass to higuain, and free run at the centerbacks).

the forwards haven't been able to combine for any attacking plays. robinho is horrible, he should be put in a closet, locked away, and the keys should be melted. kaka' might need to be benched as well, let honda play in the middle where he can dictate the game from, saponara/taraabt/pharoah for the flanks.

[red]

You want the wide players to work hard and then suggest Taraabt plays there?

[DCGweez]

http://www.godaddy.com/domains/searchre ... x?ci=54814

[p_maldini_3]

no other choice.

[red]

[vtec]

[juventino_italiano]

[vtec]

it's not spyware/malware as such. it is the legitimate godaddy site. it's just that sites track where you've been online and tailor your adds accordingly to make a buck. i want my busty asian ads back, thank you very much.

[DCGweez]

It was the link to buy seriebforums.com so you Bilanisti would have a place to chat about your squad next year.

[San Paolo]

kin ell, so not only did the link not really work, once we found out what it was supposed to be for it was as lame as feck!

[p_maldini_3]

our primavera, led by superpippo, have won the viareggio cup:



petagna's goal is superb.

[San Paolo]

Petagna's goal was superb, wearing Super Pippo's number 9 jersey as well.

[p_maldini_3]

solid away win today against a team that hadn't lost at home under their new manager.

it wasn't the greatest of games, but we were able to make the most of the mistakes made by samp's defense. the most important thing was to see the entire team playing as a unit, the attack and the defense weren't disconnected and the wide-men (taraabt and honda) did a great job of helping out the fullbacks when needed.

honda finally had a positive game, it wasn't a greatest display, but he was able to receive the ball to feet and cut inside from the left multiple times. he looks like a confidence player, so hopefully this is another step forward for him as he acclimatizes to calcio.

saponara was disappointing to me, sure it's only his 2nd start for the club, but he should at least show some passion in his game, there was no fire to his play. he looked as bad as fatass adriano in terms of effort.

regardless, we pulled through today, hopefully the team can put in another committed performance next week against juve as they have in the 2 games this past week.

[RomaShield27]

BT Sport columnist James Horncastle believes some subtle psychological tweaks have improved Milan's results, and Seedorf is at the heart of it.

/ By James Horncastle / Last updated: 27 February 2014, 18:23 GMT

Notice anything different about the San Siro?

Next to the iconic dug-outs along the side line there is now an elevated bench that sits two people; the coach and his assistant, just like at the Amsterdam Arena. Its introduction has coincided with the appointment of Clarence Seedorf at Milan. Though the change was studied for a while and agreed upon with Inter, it has come to be associated with him, received if you will, as a symbol of his willingness to see things differently and from a fresh perspective.

Once a piece of the furniture at Milan, where he played for over a decade, by installing his own at the San Siro a new stamp has been put on the club; his stamp.

And like a lifestyle guru walking into a home in need of an urgent redesign, stood with one arm crossed, the other holding his chin while deep in thought, the recommendations he has made have at least lifted the mood around the place.

He has updated their iPod. Made Milan more current, more contemporary. The team no longer steps out at San Siro to Guns and Roses’ Sweet Child O’ Mine but to Macklemore’s up-tempo rap anthem Can’t Hold Us.
Getting Milan’s players into a new frame of mind has been central to everything Seedorf has done so far.

Down in 11th place when he assumed control, they had just been beaten 4-3 by a Sassuolo side that had lost five games in a row before that meeting and have lost every game since. Floored by a teenager - the precocious Domenico Berardi scored all four - Milan needed picking up off the deck.

“They have to find conviction in themselves again,” Seedorf told La Gazzetta dello Sport. “For this reason, I changed the rhythm of training and our training habits. I want them to play, laugh, enjoy themselves.”

There have been bonding exercises; piggy-back tag and dodge ball. But it’s not all been fun and games at Milanello. There is serious work to do.

Still, “in the tactical sessions I don’t get too worked up if mistakes are made,” Seedorf adds. “Above all I show them what they’ve done well. And if it was only over 10 minutes [in a game]? Fantastic. It can become 20, then 30 and in the end an entire game. You always need to start from what’s working.”

Concentrate on the positives, that’s what he is doing. Little attention is paid to the negatives. Take the league table. “It makes for awful viewing,” Seedorf said shortly after taking over. “I’ll talk about it as little as possible.” This approach has no doubt been influenced by Bruno de Michelis, a former two-time European Karate champion and the psychologist who worked at Milan under Arrigo Sacchi and Fabio Capello, then Carlo Ancelotti at Chelsea, PSG and Real Madrid. Seedorf has brought him back to the club.

Deciding how to play has been, in part, psychological too. Seedorf wants Milan to be on the front foot, to impose themselves through possession, attacking with style and flair. Win that way and it’s more satisfying, more fulfilling than defending for 90 minutes and nicking it on the counter. Lose and you can walk off the pitch with your head held high, commanding the respect of your opponent and fans. Milan did that in the Champions League last week.

They hit the bar, the post, should have had a penalty and surprisingly out-played Atletico at the San Siro, only to suffer an undeserved 1-0 defeat.

How Milan lost that game must have left them scratching their heads, a feeling Spanish teams have often experienced after facing their Italian counterparts, not vice-versa.

An 18th goal of the season conceded from a set-piece, 8 of which have come from headers like the one Diego Costa nodded past Christian Abbiati goes some way to explaining it. Leaving the result aside, it was Milan’s best team performance of the season and that’s what Seedorf has asked his players to focus on.

They repeated it away to Sampdoria on Sunday, winning 2-0 even with a heavily rotated team, a creditable afternoon’s work even if it came against a side compromised by injuries at the back. Still, it offered another indication that Seedorf’s ideas are beginning to sink in.

Over the last week a sense to Milan’s play has emerged and a balance too. The naivety that characterised their early displays under Seedorf which contributed to their only league defeat under him, a 3-1 schooling by Napoli, appears to have been replaced by a greater maturity.

The front four are tracking back and tucking in making Milan more compact when out of possession. They’ve kept back to back clean sheets in the league for the first time all season. Milan seem to have turned a corner. Over the course of Seedorf’s tenure, they’re fourth in the form table.

Critically ill six weeks ago, he claimed to have the “anti-virus” on his arrival. Milan aren’t cured yet - nor are they perhaps well enough to beat a Juventus side without Arturo Vidal and fatigued by their trip to Trabzon in the Europa League, in a match you can catch live on BT Sport 1 this Sunday night as part of the European Football Show.

Milan’s road to recovery is still long, but in their rehabilitation there are signs of encouragement.

[San Paolo]

Just shows what finishing chances can do for you, we could have been 3-1 up at half time. we played really well for how our season has been going and Juve still somehow knew how to do fuck all to warrant a victory like that but still get it. football is shit sometimes.

[p_maldini_3]

it was probably the best 44 minutes of our season.

regardless of the final result, seedorf's milan is starting to show some swagger and he seems to be getting his tactics spot on.