Conceicao’s plan unravels as battery runs out: Tactical analysis of Juventus 2-0 AC Milan | OneFootball

AC Milan’s top four hopes suffered another hammer blow on Saturday evening as they not only dropped points but lost to a rival in Juventus.

The signs from the first half were more encouraging as the two teams traded big chances, but everything fell apart for Milan after the break. It started when Samuel Mbangula’s shot deflected in off the bar, giving Juve a deserved lead after a sustained period of pressure.

Not too long after that they struck again through the substitute Tim Weah on the counter-attack, who got the better of Fikayo Tomori and Mike Maignan to double the advantage with a low shot. The Rossoneri never really threatened much after that.

The result means that Milan tasted defeat for the first time under Sergio Conceicao and they fell to eight points behind Lazio, albeit with a game in hand. Below is the tactical analysis from Rohit Rajeev.

A similar approach

Milan were outclassed by Juventus no doubt, but how much of it was down to tactics? Milan, like in the Supercoppa Italiana semi-final win, played a very narrow system to try and constrict spaces while keeping Rafael Leao and Theo Hernandez wide as counter attacking options.

Juventus, however, played through the press by overloading and committing numbers to the wide areas. If anything it shows how ineffective Milan’s pressing is, as the players are not able to close down the spaces.

Juventus meanwhile tried used a man-marking system higher up the pitch with the centre-backs being marked to cut out passing options.

Adjustment made

This led to Milan’s best chance of the game. Ismael Bennacer drops back between the centre-backs allowing them to split wide and push the full-backs up. A quick one-two between Youssouf Fofana and Theo helps Milan to break the man-marking and find space behind McKennie.

Aside from the manoeuvres shown above Milan’s main source of threats were counter-attacks, but they didn’t have enough attackers to drive forward and create threats so they often simmered out quickly.

Defence breached

The first goal came courtesy of some poor man-marking and passive defending from Milan. With Yunus Musah not keeping tabs on his marker to Nico Gonzalez easily able to find space in the centre, the chaos was just too much. Bennacer and Fofana marking nobody didn’t help either.

The second goal showed the difference in energy levels between Milan and Juventus. Pierre Kalulu made a wayward pass and it was intercepted by Fofana. His bad touch saw Juve spring into a counter-press and not a single Milan player was anywhere close to the action to stop the resulting attack.

Routine almost works

In each tactical analysis we pick out the interesting points of set pieces, and under Conceicao so far there hasn’t been a great deal to praise with questionable ideas and execution.

Milan’s corner routine was a very interesting thing to watch this time though, with a chance falling to Tijjani Reijnders in the first half that was clearly straight off the training ground.

The data

Risk and reward are always proportional, and when you are in attack you need to take risks while passing. Who was Milan’s biggest risk taker? Reijnders leads the numbers with 37% of his passes trying to break the lines.

If one thing we can gather from the passing speed is how slow Milan were. In Conceicao’s style of play teams must play the ball vertical quickly to prevent opposition from getting back into defensive positions.

Lastly we can see how our passes were less than half of the passes Juventus played in the final third of the opponent.