GdS: ‘What a disaster’ – how Milan crashed out of Europe in San Siro ‘apocalypse’

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·19 de fevereiro de 2025

GdS: ‘What a disaster’ – how Milan crashed out of Europe in San Siro ‘apocalypse’

AC Milan crashed out of the Champions League against Feyenoord last night, and the pens have been sharpened for Theo Hernandez.

As La Gazzetta dello Sport (seen below) writes this morning, football is a team sport where victories and defeats are shared in the dressing room, but there are cases in which a single player can ‘stab a game to death’. This was the case in Milan-Feyenoord.

Vídeos OneFootball

The Rossoneri took the lead with Gimenez after just 36 seconds, immediately cancelling out the deficit from the first leg. They were in absolute control in the first half and almost doubled their lead several times, without conceding a single shot or conceding a corner.

The Dutch side resembled piranhas in Rotterdam but became ‘freshwater fish’, until the sixth minute of the second half when Theo saw red for a dive inside the box, his second yellow card of the night. From there Feyenoord grew in belief, equalised at the right time and went through.

Conceiçao makes a mistake

As mentioned, football is a team sport and so let’s widen the circle of blame to everyone else. In the dominated first half, against an opponent diminished by absences and by their own limitations, Milan should have closed the contest but were wasteful.

Rafael Leao and Joao Felix were the most involved but did not finish as they should have. Conceiçao was wrong to take off Gimenez, when, with ten men, the team most needed an obvious target man in attack.

A positive beginning

The Portuguese coach immediately launched the ‘Fantastic 4’, without keeping one on the bench to throw on. The message is clear: “Everything right away”. After just 36 seconds, Thiaw’s header back across goal found Gimenez for the equaliser.

The young Feyenoord side seemed overwhelmed by the noise of San Siro. The Diavolo tried to secure qualification for the round of 16 with a quarter of an hour of high pressure that kept the Dutch side pinned in the box.

Wellenreuther saved from Joao Felix and Theo hit the post going for a rebound. The frightened Feyenoord survives and gradually pushed their defensive 4-4-2 up the field, without however managing to get the wingers Hadj Moussa and Paixao involved.

Theo’s madness

Feyenoord hadn’t even had a shot on goal in the first half so everything seemed in order, until blatant simulation from Theo inside the box of the visiting side. The second yellow card became a red after the other one he deserved in the first half and Milan went down to ten men.

Conceiçao reshuffled to a 4-4-1 with Davide Bartesaghi coming on for Pulisic. Then he realised that Feyenoord were getting through the middle too easy, so brought Youssouf Fofana on, sacrificing Gimenez which was a questionable move.

Felix became the false nine and two minutes after that change Feyenoord scored anyway with Carranza’s header. Piling Tammy Abraham, Strahinja Pavlovic and others into the box accomplished nothing and Milan are out of the Champions League.

San Siro was more dejected than angry at full-time, almost resigned, in the awareness that this team are not upholding the values and glorious history of the club. An ‘apocalypse’ cannot be a surprise to the management, and now it will be tough to save the season.