GdS: How Milan have transformed themselves into a set-piece threat | OneFootball

One of the few positives from AC Milan’s difficult start to the season has been the goals scored from set pieces, which has become an added weapon for the attack.

As La Gazzetta dello Sport report, Stefano Pioli’s Milan last season scored 14 goals from corner kicks and this season under Paulo Fonseca the Rossoneri have already celebrated four goals from set pieces, compared to seven goals in the entire 2022-23 season.

Why has this happened? The first explanation regarding the effectiveness of corners points to Matteo Gabbia and Strahinja Pavlovic, who are always dangerous when they jump inside the box, as seen with the derby winner for the Italian and the opener against Lazio for the Serbian.

Milan bring five or six men into the area from a corner, obviously almost always the same ones: the central defenders Tomori and Gabbia, the strikers Tammy Abraham and Alvaro Morata, plus Ruben Loftus-Cheek when he is there.

Curiously, Rafael Leao and Youssouf Fofana are often there and they are not so eager to jump. Theo Hernandez takes corners from the right, from the left it is almost always Christian Pulisic or, alternatively, Tijjani Reijnders. Milan always looks for in-swinging corners, to bend it back towards the goalkeeper.

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The solutions vary from corner to corner (or from free kick to free kick), but Milan do not look for passes short or for exchanges on the end of the box. Instead, the ball is almost always arrowed in towards the near post.

Fofana’s goal against Venezia is a perfect example: the Frenchman is just inside the six-yard box and all he has to do is deflect the ball to put Joronen in difficulty. The player positioning is interesting: Fonseca chooses to have two or three men in the goal line area and often asks Morata to stay near the near post. He is the one who goes to meet the ball, with Pulisic often looking for him.

Corners aren’t everything because Milan have the problem of penalties, or rather scoring them. The Rossoneri missed three out of nine spot kicks in 2023-24, including Giroud’s against Dortmund that definitively changed the Champions League season, while they have scored two out of four this season.

The relationship with free-kicks is better: Morata changed the game against Lecce by deflecting the ball in with his head, while Gabbia won the derby with a header from Reijnders’ cross. That situation deserves a replay: Reijnders whips it from the centre-right, Milan lined up four players on the edge of the area and asked Gabbia to start two metres further back.

When Reijnders starts the run-up, Gabbia attacks the area and becomes the first Milan player to get to the ball. The trajectory is perfect, the flick too and Milan experienced derby delight. A very similar solution was tried five minutes from the end of the Leverkusen match but Reijnders’ ball went too high for the first man.

It may not always work but rest assured: Runjaic, Hayen and Italiano – the next three coaches who will face off against Milan – have studied the threat of set pieces.