AC Milan Has Two Major Issues To Fix After PSG Humiliation

It doesn’t make good reading if you’re connected to Milan. The Italian side are performing well in Serie A, the Rossoneri sit second in the league table, one point behind city cousins Inter. Yet when it comes to the Champions League, things don’t look so rosy.

Milan are bottom of Group F and winless. Stefano Pioli’s side have amassed two points from a possible nine. Moreover, they’ve failed to score a single goal in any of their three games this season, and it’s five in total if you go back to the semi final games against Inter last term. Milan haven’t scored in Europe for 450 minutes, becoming the first Italian side to hold that unwanted honour.

Milan were well and truly battered by Paris Saint-Germain in the French capital. In the aftermath of the game, Pioli stated that he believed his side performed better than PSG for most of the first half, yet Milan never really had a footing in the game, they were always kept at arm’s reach by Luis Enrique’s side.

The truth is PSG could’ve, and should’ve, scored more than the three goals they eventually did. While the French side played slick football (at times) and looked capable of cutting Milan open at any given point, Milan looked chaotic, disorganised and lacking any rhythm.

If it hadn’t been already obvious to anyone watching Milan in Europe, the creative burden fell solely on the shoulders of Rafael Leao. The Portuguese winger can be highly infuriating: brilliant one game; ineffective the next. yet there can be little doubting the 24-year-old’s talent. However, Milan were supposed to make the club less Leao-dependent last summer, with the signings of Christian Pulisic and Samuel Chukwueze. Pulisic, who has adjusted to Serie A with a minimum of fuss since arriving, has found it tougher to showcase his league form in Europe. Chukwueze, yet to get properly going, is out through injury and was guilty of missing a glorious chance late in the prior game against Borussia Dortmund that would’ve earned Milan a vital victory.

Olivier Giroud, for all the consummate professional that he is, looked every bit of his 37 years at the Parc des Princes. Giroud was mainly isolated in attack, and if he isn’t receiving service from Leao or Pulisic, his contribution to Milan’s game is minimal.

Attack has been a serious issue for Milan this season. From the sides in the top four of Serie A, only Juventus have scored less, with Milan having netted 16 times to Juve’s 15. The fact that Juve, highly pragmatic under Max Allegri and not in the business of scoring more than one goal per-game, are one goal short of Milan is a damming indictment of the Rossoneri’s firepower.

Milan’s issue is that, due to the club’s philosophy on the market, they tend to either buy strikers verging on the end of their careers (Giroud, Zlatan Ibrahimovic), ones in the earliest stages (Noah Okafor) or players who have struggled elsewhere and are short on confidence (Luka Jovic). What Milan need is a striker about to enter the peak of his career. Links to Lille forward Jonathan David have been circling for months, yet with the recent tax decree concerning how much tax athletes in Italy pay changing next summer, it remains to be seen now whether Milan could afford to sign the Canadian.

In terms of chances created, website FootMob has Milan in the bottom half of the table on this particular metric, with only 11 ‘big’ chances created, below the likes of Empoli, Monza and Frosinone. Rejuvenating the attack was one of the primary reasons for the club selling Sandro Tonali last summer, yet as of now, it hasn’t paid off.

Milan need to start creating and scoring, and now Champions League football beyond Christmas is in a perilous position. Moreover, pressure is mounting on Pioli and while Milan might sit second domestically, all is not well in the red-and-black half of Milan. An away trip to Naples this weekend will only complicate matters.