In the same stadium where on Wednesday they lost the Coppa Italia, Milan saw their chances of playing in Europe next year definitively disappear. The defeat against Roma, fully in the race for fourth place and now fifth ahead of Lazio, is the tombstone on a season that CEO Furlani called disastrous, and which will end its... calvary in the home match against Monza.
Much more important for the standings is Roma's away match in Turin.
To qualify for the next Champions League, in addition to taking all three points against Vanoli’s Torino, they must also hope that Juventus fail to win in Venice. Ranieri, who was moved to tears at the beginning and end of the match due to the tribute from his people, did well to immediately lift the team after the controversial defeat in Bergamo.
The victory of Mancini and his teammates was deserved, even if less obvious than the final 3-1 scoreline suggests, because the Rossoneri, despite playing seventy minutes with one man down due to the foolish red card shown to Gimenez, still tried, before being punished by the usual individual errors: Tomori on the 1-0 and Maignan on the 2-1.
The match, in short, was the snapshot of the season for a Milan side that needs to close out this 2024–25 and start the next season on new foundations (and with new faces). They should take inspiration from Roma and from Sir Claudio: the right coach in the right place can make a difference.
AC Milan sees red
On the night of his 500th bench in Serie A, with shrewd tactical moves, Ranieri gave a big hand to his team and created even more confusion for Milan. Without Dovbyk, the coach from Testaccio abandoned the setup seen in Bergamo—with two attacking midfielders behind a striker—to bring Paredes back as the playmaker. Soulé moved wide to the right to counter Jimenez’s pace, while former Milan player Saelemaekers lined up alongside Shomurodov to accelerate down Pavlovic’s flank.
Conceição, missing Theo Hernandez and initially benching the Leao-Fofana duo, hadn’t even had time to absorb the opponent’s tactical adjustments before finding himself behind, due to a lapse from Tomori.
From Soulé’s corner kick, Mancini headed the ball in without any challenge from the English defender, and scored in the same net where Ndoye had sent the ball on Wednesday for the 1-0.
Conceicao's team found itself trailing again, and not even halfway through the first half, reduced to ten men due to Gimenez’s red card. The Mexican struck Mancini in the chest with an elbow, away from the ball, and the VAR “suggested” the red card to Piccinini, who had not seen the foul.
Thus, the Rossoneri found themselves up against the wall—down a goal and a man—and paradoxically, that’s when they started to play.
Roma, thinking they could control the tempo, were surprised by the initiative of Jimenez and João Felix, who—with their pace—led the action that resulted in the equalizer, starting from a splendid through ball from Pulisic and finished by the Portuguese’s tap-in after Svilar had stopped the Spaniard’s attempt. The 1-1 cooled the enthusiasm of the Olimpico crowd, and before halftime, Milan showed with a couple of dangerous chances that the equalizer wasn’t a fluke.
Paredes’ strike
The second half began with the same Milan that had finished the first 45 minutes. The Rossoneri went close to making it 2-1 again with a high shot from Reijnders, but over time, the numerical disadvantage and the fatigue from Wednesday’s Coppa Italia final began to weigh.
Milan then conceded the 2-1 from a Paredes free kick, as he smartly caught Maignan and a poorly positioned wall off guard. Conceição tried to spark a reaction with a triple substitution (bringing on Fofana, Leao, and Jovic), but it only created a couple of threats.
Roma, on the other hand, scored again—a powerful shot from Cristante made it 3-1 and started the final celebrations for Ranieri, who, since his arrival, has kept up a title-winning pace. Whoever replaces him next year will have big shoes to fill, especially if Champions League qualification is secured on the final matchday.
The job of Conceição's successor, however, will be less demanding, because Milan is now a team in need of rebuilding—not just tactically, but above all in spirit. The two matches in four days at the Olimpico, combined with the current ninth place in the standings, confirm this decisively.
Source: La Gazzetta dello Sport
