Milan are one of the most successful clubs in Italy as well as in Europe, winning 18 Serie A titles and seven Champions League trophies. Milan are the second most successful club in world football with 18 official major trophies. But the present story of Rossoneris seems to be an exact contradiction of their history. Milan are currently positioned at 11th in the Serie A table, with 35 points gained in 28 games. i.e, 23 short of champions places.
Losing four games in a row in all competitions, huge pressure is mounted on the coach, Clarence Seedorf before playing Lazio this weekend. Lazio, under Reja are well organised, but the ongoing fans’ protest against their president means the Biancocolestis doesn’t earn much of the fans support on the Sunday night- something which Seedorf can cherish about.
Analysing the horrible collapse of Milan in the recent days, I have come up with three reasons to highlight the same.
1) The Embarrassing Flamini Saga:
Mathieu Flamini, joined Milan from Arsenal in 2008, in search of winning trophies, signing a 4-year contract. Flamini became a free agent in 2012 summer. Two weeks later, Galliani offered a year contract to the French man with a significant pay-cut. Milan signed Riccardo Montolivo, Bakaya Troare and Nigel De Jong as the replacements for outgoing Granero Gattuso, Clearance Seedorf and Mark Van Bommel in 2012. Despite having numerous quality holding midfielders fit, providing a contract to a player who spent an entire season on the sidelines wasn’t a bit of fruitlessness?!?!
But fooling the world, Flamini proved the trust of Galliani had in him with fine performances over the year. Flamini appeared in 22 Milan games last season, playing a crucial role in the qualification for the champions league after a sloppy early start. Flamini was once again thrown out as free agent in the summer of 2013, but this time Galliani came up with a 2-year contract. But the contract deal came late as the Frenchman preferred his old club Arsenal ahead of Milan. Providing a contract at the right time when a top player felt happy at Milan, a representation of foolishness?
2) El Shaarawy – Why he wasn’t placed in the market?
El Sharaawy enjoyed a successful season, scoring 19 goals in 46 games in all competitions. But the 19th of his goals came in February 2013- the statistic which would not help any of the strikers to feel proud and to top that, the scenario of Pato wasn’t different either. Milan rejected huge bids from the clubs in La Liga and Premier League when the striker was in top form, but finally they forced themselves to sell Alexandre Pato in the winter of 2013.
Failing to learn from the early mistakes, Galliani announced that El Shaarawy would not be in the transfer market for sale, last summer. The young Italian striker suffered an injury early in this season from which he hasn’t recovered yet. El Shaarawy has played just 6 games for Milan this season, scoring only one. If Milan had pushed him in the transfer market last summer, the Rossoneri’s could have got a quality striker from the money gained. At present, there is no guarantee that any club would pay such a huge price of over £22M for El Shaarawy- the amount which they showed the will to pay last summer.
3) Sacking of Allegri – Was that really needed?
First, Second, Third- mentioned, respectively the places which Milan finished under Massimiliano Allegri in his 3-full seasons in-charge. Milan were in a good shape under Allegri, even after the sloppy starts. Given the resources, Allegri has always proved his efficiency and when the new players are in the process of understanding their coach slowly, there comes the managerial sack in January.
Clarence Seedorf, the former Milan player was named as the replacement of Allegri in January. The managerial change has so far been a disaster. Milan have won only four out of the 12 games under Seedorf while they have lost 4 in a row now, with a trip to Rome this weekend.