The five key battles that could win or lose the game for Milan against Roma | OneFootball

AC Milan’s Coppa Italia campaign gets back underway tonight at San Siro, and they face off against Roma hoping to book a place in the semi-finals.

Milan advanced to the quarter-final stage with a crushing 6-1 win over Serie B side Sassuolo and they know that they could meet Inter in the final four if they were to get there, but Roma also have an eye on potentially facing Lazio.

Sergio Conceicao’s first bit of silverware with the club came via a domestic cup competition and he would no doubt like to be the man to end the Coppa Italia drought, but a tough game awaits against a resurgent Roma under Claudio Ranieri.

The five key battles

It will be a strange evening for Tammy Abraham for many reasons. Firstly he is facing off against his parent club and no doubt wants to send a message to them and to Milan with a good performance and a goal or two, to boost his chances of a permanent stay. With Santiago Gimenez waiting in the wings on the bench, the mission will also be to try fight for a starting spot.

His opponent will be Mats Hummels, a player that Milan were actually linked with signing during the summer before he joined Roma as a free agent. With Gianluca Mancini out injured the 36-year-old German will anchor the defence, having made 13 appearances this season so far.

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At the other end, Paulo Dybala loves playing against Milan. He scored in the league meeting just over a month ago against the Rossoneri at San Siro with a lovely volley, and he has 10 goals and six assists in 26 games against them. Milan are the team he has faced the most in his career with 15 wins, 6 draws and 5 defeats.

Given that the Argentina likes to occupy central areas, Youssouf Fofana should be the man tasked with picking him up. The Frenchman missed the derby against Inter because he had to serve a suspension so will aim to make up for lost time, but he will have to be at his best to limit the influence of La Joya.

Moving to Milan’s left flank, Theo Hernandez will come up against a familiar foe in Alexis Saelemaekers. The Belgian has found a new lease of life under Ranieri playing as a right wing-back, using his energy and seemingly infinite battery to bomb up and down the flank, while he also has four goals and two assists in 11 Serie A games.

Theo meanwhile is not having the best of seasons. Every good performance seems to be following by three or four bad or normal ones, though during the derby against Inter he did have a hand in the opening goal and was part of a defensive unit that maintained focus right until conceding very late on. Against Saelemaekers, he will have to be diligent in both phases.

Artem Dovbyk is Roma’s main threat from a scoring point of view and given the money they invested to sign him from Girona in the summer it is perhaps not a surprise. He has 12 goals in 30 games across all competitions, however he has also been accused of being a bit wasteful at times, and his build-up and hold-up game is still developing.

A fascinating duel awaits for him against Strahinja Pavlovic, who has gone from looking like one of the January exits to now being a starter under Conceicao. The Serbian is aggressive and proactive in his defensive style, and he will look to cut the ball out before it even gets to Dovbyk, while there will no doubt be plenty of aerial duels contested too.

Finally, we end with Rafael Leao against Zeki Celik, again on Milan’s left side. Leao had his flashes during the derby, including providing the ball that led to Reijnders opening the scoring, but in truth he was contained a bit by the decision to defend the lead for the entire second half.

There is talk of him not being at 100%, but if he is even close to being on top form then he could give Celik a very tough game. The 27-year-old was actually linked with a deadline day move as Fulham came forward, but the full-back is set to get a rare start as the outside centre-back.