Lazio played with a 4-5-1 formation , defended well and were looking to play a counter-attacking game. Milan, however, never looked dangerous or hungry enough and were rarely caught napping in the first half which was quite a boring half for the spectators.
The second half looked a lot more lively, the most significant highlight for Milan was the penalty kick that was initially awarded by the referee, but then through some mysterious discussions with the linesman, changed his mind. Replays show that Diaz clearly punched the ball away from Shaarawy's chest inside the penalty box.
The game looked very erratic, with neither side holding the ball long enough. Balls were bouncing off of players, misplaced passes, aimless crosses, wide shots, no glamorous football was to be seen here. Allegri looked quite confused and decided to take out Ambrosini for Ceedorf and El Shaarawy for Emmanuelson. The double substitution made little difference for Milan in terms of the quality of possession as they still didn't look dangerous and carried on with their pointless early crosses. In the deadly minutes of the game, however, Hernanes finished a good ball that was delivered to him from a defensive error by Milan's dependable wall , none other than Thiago Silva. Abbiati could have done better to save Hernanes' shot but nevertheless, his defense let him down and would be primarily responsible for that goal. with 13 minutes left to play, Milan found themselves a goal down. In a desperate throw of the dice, Allegri then decided to withdraw Van Bommel and put on Maxi Lopez for his debut which proved to be a bad decision as without the presence of a holding midfielder, Hernanes and co had all the space in the world and they did well to take advantage of Milan's tactical blunder by making it 2-0. After Lazio scored the second goal in the 85th minute , the match was as good as over, as Milan continued their desperate attempts getting close but never really threatening until the player's pretty much accepted their defeat.
Lessons learned:
Raja certainly learned from Lazio's defeat to Milan last week in the Coppa Italia and scrapped his 3 man defense idea. going with a 4-5-1 formation, focusing on the counter-attack. They were well organized in defense and were never really threatened by a lethargic Milan Offense.
For Milan, there were plenty of lessons to take home , here's a few of them:
1) Abate seems to be going towards the center where it is quite crowded, or attempting early crosses instead of his usual bursting wide runs which have caused opposition defenders lots of problems in the past.
2) Robinho was completely absent and in my opinion El Shaarawy was adding much needed energy in the Milan attack. A questionable substitution there. Emmanuelson , although not great on the right, at least brings in some creativity with his dribbling and passing skills.
3) A midfield consisting of Ambrosini, Van Bommel, and Nocerino is severely lacking in creativity and isn't going to work no matter how great the attackers are.
4) Nesta has continuously been trying to play very predictable long balls from center midfield (Pirlo style), which is probably an instruction from Allegri who maybe fails to realize that Nesta is not Pirlo. This simply causes lots of frustrations for the attackers who have to track back and try to win back those loose balls.
4) Substituting both holding midfielders (Ambro and MVB) when you're only 1-0 down is a suicidal move. There were 13 minutes left to play and 5 minutes of extra time ( a total of 18 minutes) , more than enough time for the team to bounce back from a goal down. If lazio hadn't doubled their lead due to the absence of an anchor man, who knows what would've happened towards the end. The gung-ho strategy was uncalled for , and maybe would've been suitable a little later in the game.
In conclusion, sub-par performances from almost every player on the Milan team tonight, coupled with a few tactical blunders by Mr. Allegri gave Lazio a much needed victory which will have delighted their fans. For Milan , they must get their act together very soon as February is the toughest months for them with 2 matches against Juventus (1 in the league and 1 in the Coppa Italia) , a fixture against Arsenal, and face offs with Napoli and Udinese.
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