GdS: ‘Cup craving’ – Limited rotation vs. Sassuolo as Fonseca wants the Coppa Italia

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·3 de diciembre de 2024

GdS: ‘Cup craving’ – Limited rotation vs. Sassuolo as Fonseca wants the Coppa Italia

AC Milan will take on Sassuolo at San Siro in the Coppa Italia tonight, hoping to book their place in the final eight of the competition.

La Gazzetta dello Sport (seen below) this morning has an analysis ahead of the game, titled: ‘Cup craving. Fonseca wants it, it will be a true Milan with Abraham-Leao.The Rossoneri coach gives great importance to the trophy: ‘We must be ambitious’. Room for Rafa, limited rotation in view of Atalanta’.

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The comparison with the same match from a year ago – the last 16 of the cup – says a lot. The likes of Jan-Carlo Simic, Chaka Traoré, Alex Jimenez to Luka Romero all started against Cagliari but it was impossible to do otherwise because the squad was decimated by injuries.

A comfortable win resulted against the Sardinians, yet Paulo Fonseca’s choices for this evening say something else: that Milan care a lot about the competition, that they have a wider squad with quality alternatives, and that they are no longer conditioned by physical problems.

A trophy target

The coach reiterated loud and clear to his team that he cares a lot about the Coppa Italia. It is a trophy that can give prestige to the season, which still remains a bit in the shadows in Serie A, finding flashes of light in the Champions League.

Realistically Milan cannot expect to go on and win their eighth European Cup even if they are in good form, while in Serie A they remain six points from the top four. In the cup, the Rossoneri enter the scene in the round of 16, starting on par with the other big teams once again

Fonseca was explicit: he wants to try to win the Italian Cup, a trophy that Milan have lacked since 2003. In his pre-match interview released that was released yesterday afternoon, the Portuguese sent out a rallying cry of sorts.

“We must be ambitious and if we want to go to the final, which must be our objective, we need to win against Sassuolo. We consider him a Serie A opponent. We work to improve every day: we must be the ones to take the fans by the hand, with them at our side we are stronger,” he said.

Selection choices

Rafael Leao will still be the one to take the team by the hand, and it seems that Tijjani Reijnders and Youssouf Fofana will join him. The objective is a priority and the choices confirm it. It doesn’t mean that there will be a lack of rotation, but that rotation will be limited.

Once the cup match is over, Fonseca will only have 48 hours to prepare for the away match in Bergamo against Atalanta. Tonight, though, Mike Maignan and Theo Hernandez will be out due to dental surgery and a bruised foot respectively.

Marco Sportiello will be between the posts, Emerson Royal will rest with Davide Calabria on the right, then the pairing of Fikayo Tomori and Strahinja Pavlovic should be in the centre of the defence and Filippo Terracciano on the left.

Ahead of the ‘workaholics’ Reijnders and Fofana it should be Samuel Chukwueze, Ruben Loftus-Cheek and Leao behind Tammy Abraham. Leao is not too tired: he already rested in the first half of the Bratislava game, and for Tammy it is another opportunity to find the next.

Malick Thiaw and Matteo Gabbia should also rest, in addition to Christian Pulisic and Alvaro Morata. Francesco Camarda will be on the bench, ready to come on in the second half and hoping to get his first senior goal.

Fonseca wants a hat-trick: he won the Portuguese Cup in 2016 with Braga and the Ukrainian Cup three times at the helm of Shakhtar Donetsk. If he succeeds at Milan, he will follow on from Carlo Ancelotti, who raised it with the Rossoneri in 2003.