This evening, coach Stefano Pioli and his men will face Juventus at the Allianz Stadium in matchday 4 of the Serie A.
The Bianconeri are placed in the 17th position in the league table while AC Milan have the full points going into this fixture.
The league forms of both clubs are not indicators of how we should expect the game to be between the two strong sides.
Allegri is determined to turn his luck around by beating Stefano Pioli's team and move up the ranking. The experienced Italian tactician put pressure on Milan already by claiming that Milan has more to lose in this match and that "they are the favourites".
Juve's previous fixture in the Champions League was a win against Swedish side Malmo by putting the ball three times past the net.
Milan's last fixture was also in the Champions League, but unfortunately, they have lost to a very good Liverpool side 3-2 at a tough Anfield stadium.
Stefano Pioli is yet to win a game in his career against Massimiliano Allegri, but he has a chance to rectify that this time.
Allegri has a couple of absences on his team, they are: Arthur and Kaio Jorge.
As for Milan, there are important absences, though: Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Davide Calabria, Olivier Giroud, Tiémoué Bakayoko, Rade Krunic and Junior Messias who is not physically fit just yet. There was some doubt over Mike Maignan who suffers some pain in his hand, but he should be okay as he wants to play against Juventus and help his teammates.
The positive note, however, is that Milan still has quality, especially in front. The likely front players are Rafael Leao on the left, Alexis Saelemaekers on the right, and Ante Rebic as the striker with Brahim Diaz being the playmaker.
These players have agility and speed as their main features which will be Stefano Pioli's main weapon going into this match. AC Milan will want to exploit the space left by the Bianconeri players and hit them on the counter-attack.
Franck Kessié will play also a huge role by keeping the threat of Paulo Dybala as minimal as possible. The marking will have to be tight as he creates chances and can be really lethal thanks to his supersonic speed and dribbling.
On the right, Fikayo Tomori should get the nod as the right-back to replace Davide Calabria. Alessandro Florenzi is not in his best level and may not start. The idea here is that Tomori would utilise his speed and defensive awareness to close out the attacking contributions coming from the flank.
It will be a big match, recent forms don't really matter, as Juventus and Milan are rivals, the players will be galvanised and will want to conquer the opposition.
Il Diavolo and the Old Lady have faced each other 173 times in Serie A, in the previous 172, 67 wins for the bianconeri, 51 for the rossoneri and 54 draws. As for the games only in Turin, there were 86 matches, 43 victories for Juve, 22 wins for Milan, and 21 draws.
No team, in the history of Serie A, has won more games against Juventus than Milan, but it is the first time, in the history of the Italian league, that Milan have challenged Juventus with at least 8 points of advantage in the standings before Matchday 16. Furthermore, the Rossoneri could win two away matches against the Bianconeri in the same calendar year for the first time since 1968 (data by Milan Press).
Here are the probable lineups:
Milan 4-2-3-1: Maignan; Tomori, Kjaer, Romagnoli, Theo Hernandez; Kessié, Tonali; Saelemaekers, Brahim Diaz, Leao; Rebic
Juventus 4-4-2: Szczesny; Danilo, De Ligt, Chiellini, Alex Sandro; Cuadrado, Bentancur, Locatelli, Rabiot; Dybala, Morata.
