Yahoo Sports ‘Almost worse than Fassone and Mirabelli’ – Longoni critical of Milan’s management
Journalist Andrea Longoni has taken aim at AC Milan’s management, labelling it worse than the era with Marco Fassone and Massimiliano Mirabelli.
It has been yet another turbulent last few days for Milan, following on from Paulo Fonseca’s decision to criticise the attitudes of certain members of the team after the win against Red Star on Wednesday.
That generated enough headlines on its own, as did the decision from the directors to not make their presence felt at Milanello the next day, which some perceived to be leaving the coach alone.
What it means is that Milan are going into their birthday celebrations with a dark cloud overhanging, and not just because of the poor results in the league to this point either.
Longoni spoke in his weekly column for MilanNews published on the day of the 125th anniversary celebration game against Genoa, and he picked apart why the current management are failing.
“It will be a party tonight, but it will certainly not be celebrated in a historical period to be framed, on the contrary. It will come at the end of a hectic week, yet another. This time for the sensational outburst from Fonseca after the Red Star game,” he began.
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“A few months have passed since the start of the season, but it seems like a year for everything that has happened. Cooling break deserted, gestures to silence the crowd, anarchy on penalties, punitive benches, anger towards a substitution: everything and more, seasoned with too many defeats and too few points won.
“In the background, a management that is too often absent and detached from what should be the real focus, that is, the pitch. The absence from Milanello the day after the coach’s harsh public attack on the team, cries out for vengeance.
“Justifying it by explaining that they did not want to delegitimise the coach is even worse. Fonseca was delegitimised when Ibra met with the team in the dressing room without him, or when he himself put him in a corner in a press conference (“I decide when the market ends”), or when Saelemaekers was sold, whose confirmation had been loudly requested by the coach.
“An intervention on Thursday at Milanello would have been a must to reinforce his thinking, but instead the management opted out, which also happened in the famous episode of the cooling break, defined by Furlani as a ‘non-event’.
“The players are to blame, the coach is to blame, but the main problem is upstream. Almost worse than Fassone and Mirabelli: they had inherited a disastrous Milan, unlike the current management… It will be a celebration, but many protagonists will be missing, among the most important.
“Some weren’t even invited: a lack of style and respect for the history of these colours. Not inviting Rivera is something that is neither here nor there, despite the dispute over image rights. Not inviting Boban, equally.
“Just like having the invitation delivered to Maldini not from the upper levels, like any warehouse worker (with the utmost respect). It will be a party, but a great piece of the great Milan will be missing. A party where the birthday boy is almost gone…”
