On Tuesday, Milan announced that Matteo Gabbia had a consultation with Professors Ernest Schilders and Rowena Johnson at Mayo Clinic Healthcare in London. They decided that surgery would take place to resolve an inguinal hernia issue. The defender will remain sidelined for about a month and, if everything goes well, his return to the pitch should come after the international break at the end of March.
Only four-centre backs:
During these weeks without Gabbia, Max Allegri will therefore have only four center-backs available: Fikayo Tomori, Strahinja Pavlovic, Koni De Winter, and David Odogu. The first three will obviously be Allegri’s primary choices, and he will then have just one alternative, the very young German center-back (born in 2006) who this season has played only 15 minutes with Milan’s first team. In recent days, the ex Juventus head coach said that Odogu has grown a lot compared to when he first arrived. However, the fact that against Parma he chose to use Davide Bartesaghi as the left-sided “braccetto” rather than the German suggests that he is still not ready, as relayed via Milan News.
In recent days, there is one question that all Milan fans have asked:
Why did the club not sign a defender in January?
Head coach Massimiliano Allegri would gladly have welcomed an extra option in that department, but the request was not granted. Yet the risk of this exact situation was entirely foreseeable. With only five center-backs, one of whom is not ready yet, it was clear that once a somewhat serious injury occurred an emergency would arise. Despite this, the final decision was not to bring in any defender during the January transfer window. Will Milan regret that choice?
