Football Italia
·24 August 2024
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·24 August 2024
Milan again showed a terrible weakness in defending counter-attacks, as they capitulated to newly-promoted Parma with Dennis Man and Matteo Cancellieri goals.
Paulo Fonseca got a rude awakening, but the Rossoneri clawed their way back from 2-0 down to draw with Torino in stoppages. Alvaro Morata got injured in that game, joining Alessandro Florenzi and Marco Sportiello on the treatment table, so Noah Okafor got a rare start with Strahinja Pavlovic making his debut. The Ducali had a rough start, out of the Coppa Italia to Palermo and drawing 1-1 with Fiorentina. Hernani, Yordan Osorio, Adrian Benedyczak and Gabriel Charpentier were injured, but Enrico Delprato returned from suspension.
This match made history as the first Serie A fixture to be shown live on American broadcast television, airing on CBS.
It took under 90 seconds to break the deadlock, as the ball was rolled across from the left by Emanuele Valeri for the easy Dennis Man tap-in from six yards at the back post, left relatively unmarked.
A Yunus Musah long-range strike was deflected, but there were two huge chances in 30 seconds, as first the Pavlovic header was fingertipped over the crossbar, then Tijjani Reijnders pulled a ball across the face of goal and nobody was able to get the tap-in.
Another Pavlovic header from a corner skimmed the near post and Simon Sohm horribly scuffed wide when on the counter with Man.
Pavlovic needed an extraordinary sliding tackle to stop Man scoring when clear on goal, then there was a foul on Mike Maignan before the Valentin Mihaila follow-up hit the woodwork.
In first half stoppages, Mihaila again sprung the offside trap to go clear as Fikayo Tomori only slowed him down a little, so Maignan had to stick out a boot to parry the finish.
Milan came out fighting for the restart, within seconds Reijnders hit a scorcher from outside the box that thumped the crossbar, then Noah Okafor volleyed over.
Pavlovic needed another desperate tackle to stop Parma going 2-0 up with Mihaila, but Suzuki parried the Christian Pulisic volley.
Ange-Yoan Bonny had the ball in the net on the hour mark for Parma, but started the run too early and was offside on the Adrian Bernabé pass.
Man almost got another on the counter, his right-foot curler inches wide after committing Davide Calabria with a change of direction.
Milan did equalise when Rafael Leao danced down the left, completed a give and go with Theo Hernandez and rolled it across for the easiest of Pulisic tap-ins.
Emerson Royal and Youssouf Fofana made their Milan debuts moments later, but Parma restored their lead on another counter-attack sparked by a misplaced Leao pass. Pontus Almqvist started the run from his own half and rolled across for the Matteo Cancellieri tap-in.
Man 2 (P), Pulisic 66 (M), Cancellieri 77 (P)