Milan's season has gone from being intermittent to difficult, and now it has taken an even sharper turn towards negativity and heaviness. The three consecutive league defeats against Torino, Bologna, and Lazio, combined with the Champions League playoff elimination, have brought the environment to the brink of unsustainability.
Within the folds of the season, there are also the performances and trajectories of individual players. The ones who have stood out in a positive way can be counted on one hand, while a large part of the squad has disappointed—some more than others.
In the first months, the player most targeted by friendly fire at San Siro was undoubtedly Emerson Royal. The former Tottenham full-back never won over the fans, and even before arriving in Rossonero, he was criticized because his signing was a decision by the club that was not shared by the fan base.
After the injury that sidelined Royal for about three months, the title of the most booed player at the Meazza passed to Musah. Yunus is a player who, both under Fonseca and Conceição, has played many minutes because he was considered a stabilizer in a squad that, at least until the end of January, was not well constructed.
Often included in the starting eleven, his performances have gradually declined week after week. From a decisive piece at the Bernabéu to the scapegoat in Zagreb in the final Champions League group stage match, where he was sent off for two yellow cards born out of naivety.
Neither February nor March were good months for the American midfielder, and after his open-goal miss against Como, the situation at the stadium became difficult to bear. It became so evident that, in an overseas interview during his national team training camp, he candidly admitted to feeling the pressure. He acknowledged that he needs to give more and that in training, he executes plays that don’t come off in matches because he is not at ease.
The worst certainty of this season is that a toxic atmosphere has developed at Milan. The majority of the blame must be placed on the ownership and management, who neither made the right choices nor defended the ones they did make. The result has been two unprotected coaches and, consequently, players increasingly under attack from game to game. By the way, for fans looking to channel their passion amid the ups and downs, options like bet football for exciting matches can add a thrilling dimension to following the sport.
Musah is a young man who just turned 22. He does not yet have the stature to withstand all the criticism and boos directed at him. Most likely, he is not ready for a club like Milan. But he had the strength and honesty to admit it. Beyond his technical limitations, there is the athlete and there is the man. Seeing players so ‘exposed’ in front of everyone is the great failure of the club.
What did Yunus Musah say recently?
"Being at Milan, you expect to have this pressure. It's a privilege because, at the end of the day, if I wasn't a professional footballer, I wouldn't experience this stuff. You have to take the positives as well and then, when people are criticizing you, saying bad stuff about you, I've found so much of that during my career that it doesn't phase me at all now. At the beginning, you see it and you listen to it. Then afterward, you just see it and it still gets inside. You get better at ignoring the comments, but you still see them. It gets inside you," he said to Goal.com.
