Positional problem and Terracciano’s role: Tactical analysis of Hellas Verona 0-1 AC Milan | OneFootball

AC Milan returned to winning way against Hellas Verona on Friday night, but it certainly wasn’t a game to scream about with the Rossoneri failing to impress against a struggling side.

As has often been the case this season, Milan left fans wanting more against a ‘lower quality side’, and even if the result came, it keeps an uncomfortable conversation relevant: where is the balance?

The Diavolo have lost games with good performances and won without them, and the lack of ability to be consistent in their performances is only a damaging thing in the long run as faith in Fonseca wavers.

On Friday, Milan’s midfield duo of Youssouf Fofana and Tijjani Reijnders proved the difference, as they so often have, with the Dutchman firing home the former’s well-placed pass. A rare glimpse of quality in an otherwise poor game.

As always, the tactical analysis for this game has been provided by our writer Rohit Rajeev.

The shape of both teams

Hellas Verona adopted a zonal marking approach playing five at the back. They would cede possession and let Milan have the ball, but this would mean that they needed to have 100% concentration at all times.

This meant that gaps between the lines started to appear. One of the Verona defenders was forced to make a decision to stay on Reijnders or to follow Tammy Abraham and it cost him.

Verona played pretty much with a rest defence of three players with rest of the seven outfield players playing very narrow restricting the passing lanes that Milan were allowed to have.

Milan lacked a deep-lying playmaker to make the quick switches to catch Verona off guard. The home side did not keep more than 30-35 metres between their lines of defence in view of keep the Rossoneri stifled and forcing errors in possession.

Terracciano’s role

Filippo Terracciano – who started this game as a double pivot player – played quite the shift. When Rafael Leao got injured and Theo came on it meant that Terracciano would sometimes slide in at left-back and allow Theo to go forward. He would rotate in possession multiple times but lacked any sort of cutting edge.

Theo meanwhile would go forward and help in causing overloads in different areas of the pitch.

Set piece analysis

Milan used the spare man (Samuel Chukwueze) to prevent the pass back to Lazovic who was taking the throw. There was a extra man who was free in the second phase which caused a 2v1 situation against Milan and forced Fofana to foul the opponent.

Milan had an interesting tactic in their attacking set pieces. Reijnders targeted the far post with Malick Thiaw while decoy runs were made. The video below explains.

A mildly worrying stat is how Milan lost the ball 22 times but Verona did not possess the attacking venom to make it a chance with only two leading to shots.

The positional problem

Pep Guardiola’s assistant once made an observation that whenever an action was made – for example dribbling against a player – it was to be done with a team intention in mind.

In the example below, Thiaw dribbles past two defenders and advances the ball, yet everyone around is static. That means almost three defenders were occupying the same zone, which is sacrilege in the positional play that Fonseca is trying to achieve.