Today’s game reserved not only a defeat for the AC Milan Women’s team, but a bone crushing performance by table leaders Juventus who managed to take down the rossonere 4-0, increase their point advantage to 6 and get closer to the league title.
Starting lineup and the Juventus dominance on the first half
In order to replace the injured Jane, Ganz opted to deploy Veró as regista alongside Grimshaw and Hasegawa in the midfield, while the rest of the team was composed pretty much as expected (Korenciva between the posts, Fusetti, Agard and Spinelli in front of her, Tucceri-Cimini and Bergamaschi as wingers, Dowie e Giacinti upront). Unfortunately, that choice proved wrong as Veró left a lot of spaces behind her while advancing and both Spinelli and Tucceri-Cimini were not up to the task to contain the pacey biaconere attack. The outcome was a dominating first half from Juventus, with Bonansea breaking the deadlock after only 8 minutes on the game, when all 3 centre-backs could have done better to prevent it, and Hurtig doubled the lead after a clinical pass from Bonansea, on a quick counterattack, at minute 26. Milan managed to get their first attempt at Giuliani only when the clock reached the 35 minutes mark.
The rossonere scored from a corner right before the halftime break, but it was disallowed because of a Dowie’s foul on Giuliani.
Change of formation and the final blow.
Ganz, on the 50th minute, decided to replace Spinelli with Rizza, switching the formation from the traditional 3-5-2 to a 4-3-3, with Bergamaschi as left winger and Dowie and Giacinti taking turns at the central striker role. This change, adding that Juventus decided to play for the counter, allowed Veró to advance a more attacking role, and Milan finally was able to play a good 30 minutes of football, eventually creating chances but, once again, suffering from the lack of accuracy.
Regrettably, Milan begun to get tired from the game and gave even more room for the bianconere to explore on counterattacks. Guarino noticed that and made changes to her team, introducing Maria Alves, Staskova, Caruso and Zamanian, but Ganz, once again, took too long to read the game and paid for it after a clearly tired Fusetti lost the ball in the midfield and the Milan’s defense was not able to recompose the shape, allowing Staskova to pass Korenciova and score the third goal for the hosts. On injury time, Caruso were able to receive the ball, find the perfect position and score a screamer, settling the score once and for all.
When It rains it pours
This defeat made the AC Milan’s dream to win the scudetto even harder then it already was and, in addition, the rossonere saw their advantage to Sassuolo, third-place sitter, reduce to 5 points after the neroverde beat Fiorentina.
Coming next
Next Sunday, Milan will face Internazionale on the Coppa Italia semifinal first leg and we all hope this game does not affect their performance.
