Football Italia
·18 October 2024
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·18 October 2024
There are growing reports that Paulo Fonseca will drop Rafael Leao and Tammy Abraham to the Milan bench for tomorrow’s Serie A game against Udinese, with Theo Hernandez already suspended.
It kicks off at San Siro on Saturday at 17.00 UK time (16.00 GMT).
The Rossoneri badly need a boost after their 2-1 defeat to Fiorentina, a game that continues to cause controversy after both Theo Hernandez and Abraham had their penalties parried by David De Gea.
The fact neither spot-kick was taken by Christian Pulisic irritated the coach, so with Theo Hernandez sitting out a two-match ban for insulting the referee, Abraham should be benched in favour of Alvaro Morata.
More remarkable is the report that Rafael Leao will also be left out of the starting XI, bringing in Noah Okafor, while Pulisic can play in a more central trequartista role and Samuel Chukwueze on the right.
Leao was on international duty with Portugal and Milan have seven games coming up in a 21-day period, so resting him might seem a logical thing to do.
Inevitably, any time the star man is left out still hits the headlines and leads to speculation there is more going on behind the scenes.
So far this season, Leao has contributed one goal and four assists in nine games between Serie A and the Champions League.