Milan faced Bodo-Glimt in the 3rd round of Europa League Qualifiers winning 3-2 to go on to face Rio Ave in the playoff on October 1st. Qualification for Europa League groups would ensure Milan 15 Million to spend in the transfer window. Here are a few thoughts and tactical notes from the match
Colombo debut
A few hours before the game Milan confirmed through their website that Zlatan Ibrahimovic tested positive for coronavirus and will be out for the match against Bodo-Glimt. With Rebic suspended and Leao still not match fit, Pioli handed a debut to Lorenzo Colombo.
Lorenzo Colombo is a striker who depends on his positioning just like a good poacher does. Unlike Zlatan Ibrahimovic Colombo does not involve in buildup play or drop back to pull defenders out of position making space for wingers to drive into. His work-rate is really impressive and presses quite well for a player in his debut and when they win the ball back he positions himself on the shoulder of the last defender waiting for balls to be fed into his game.
The Double Pivot
The double pivot of Kessie and Bennacer have been very important to Milan’s high press. While Kessie pushes up to press Bennacer drops back to screen the defense incase Bodo-Glimt get past Milan’s press. Bodo-Glimt were overloading Milan’s wings and this made Pioli make our double pivot move very horizontally to have a horizontal press. Whenver Gabbia or Kjaer made forward runs one of them sat back as a makeshift CB
Hakan and Saelemaekers position
With the absence of Ibra and Colombo who does not possess movement like the big swede, Pioli had to improvise so that Bodo-Glimt dooes not isolate Colombo he had Saelemaekers plat more infield and closer to Colombo. This idea was also in view to keep numbers in the middle since Bodo seemed to have a numerical advantage in the middle and was suffocating our build up play. With Saelemaekers moving infield and Glimt playing a midfield-block, Theo Hernandez was making a lot of overlapping runs being supported by Hakan taking up the half spaces on the left flank. Once the intensity of Bodo’s pressing declined you could see Saelemaekers drifting wide. Incase Bodo would clog the left side Saelemaekers would play diagonal ball to Samu who drifts infield with Calabria overlapping him
The Pressure on Calabria
With Bodo’s most creative player playing on the left flank, their main tactic was to create a numerical advantage on the right wing and put in crosses like we saw for the first goal and towards the end of the match. They created 3v1 situations of 3v2 situations and either used their pact to get pass Calabria or passed around and by passed him quite a fair times. And with Milan still lacking proper match fitness they couldn’t keep up with Bodo-Glimt’s pacy wingers
CONCLUSION
Milan, though untidy, got over the line in the end. A neat goal from a set-piece from Hakan was the difference in the end. Milan seemed to have come up with a few corner routines and overall the confidence in our gameplay seems to be very high. All Milan need now is a few signings and match-fitness.
The Milan Blog 