Milan v Juventus

Please say Zapata is healthy for this fixture, Bonera scares me to death.

I prefer Bonera over Zapata.

Zaccardo is probably better than both.

Is Silvestre still alive btw? He was solid when he played.

M99 wrote:Is Silvestre still alive btw? He was solid when he played.

He's gone into the "Didac zone".

No chance for us to win, at best a draw. Tevez will score the winning goal, then say post match that "Milan got the wrong forward from City" or something along those lines.

Is Balotelli still injured ?

I believe so, he's in doubt for the match

...nice

Daniele Bonera has made it clear that AC Milan do not fear Juventus ahead of this weekend's Serie A encounter at San Siro.

The Rossoneri sit only ninth in the league table at the moment and are trailing the leaders by 31 points, yet Bonera is confident they can get a good result on Sunday when they host the reigning Italian champions.

"We know there’s a long road ahead of us but we’re not afraid of Juventus," Bonera, 32, told Milan Channel.

"We want to continue with the good results we’ve been starting to get recently."

The defender then went on to single out the attacking partnership of Carlos Tevez and Fernando Llorente as Juventus' biggest threat, but warned his team-mates there's more to the reigning champions than just their attack.

"Tevez and Llorente are a good mix as you can see from the numbers, but it’s not just those two. The rest of the team support them very well. They have great individual players in the middle and at the back."

Vidal is suspended for this match, thankfully.

AC Milan coach Clarence Seedorf believes that while Mario Balotelli is a player of great potential, Giampaolo Pazzini is a more reliable option up front.

Both strikers are minor fitness doubts for Sunday's Serie A showdown with league leaders Juventus at San Siro, as Balotelli is struggling with a shoulder problem and Pazzini is still feeling the effects of a broken nose.

Seedorf is optimistic that both players will be fit to face the champions but hinted that Pazzini's availability is of greater importance for the Rossoneri.

"We’ll see about Balotelli today," the Dutchman told reporters on Saturday. "Pazzini is feeling some pain as well but he should make it.

"Pazzini has more experience than Balotelli and where Balotelli has space to grow, Pazzini provides more of a guarantee."

Seedorf is also hopeful that Mattia De Sciglio and Michael Essien will be in the right condition to feature against the Bianconeri.

"I think De Sciglio will be available for selection even though he’s still feeling some pain [in his ankle]," the Milan boss explained.

"Essien is doing well and we have to remember that he has to play against Ateltico [Madrid in the Champions League] as well. He could start the match tomorrow [Sunday] and we’ll decide on that today."

AC Milan have confirmed that star striker Mario Balotelli has been ruled out of Sunday's Serie A showdown with Juventus at San Siro.

The Italy international suffered a shoulder injury in last week's 1-0 loss at home to Atletico Madrid and has been omitted from Clarence Seedorf's 23-strong squad for the visit of the Italian champions.

In addition, Balotelli will play no part in his country's friendly clash with Spain at the Vicente Calderon on Wednesday, with Milan's focus now on getting the 23-year-old fit for the second leg of their Champions League last-16 tie with the Rojiblancos on March 11.

However, in a boost for the Rossoneri, veteran forward Giampaolo Pazzini has been included, after being cleared to wear a mask to protect the broken nose he suffered at Sampdoria last weekend.

Full-back Mattia De Sciglio is also available for selection after recovering from a minor ankle problem.

Poli is favorite to start over Honda, so we will essentially be playing a 4-4-1-1

Milantildeath wrote:Poli is favorite to start over Honda, so we will essentially be playing a 4-4-1-1

That's based on the assumption that Poli doesn't just slot into Honda's RW role in the 4-2-3-1.

Actually, we play a 4-2-3-1 when attacking and a 4-4-1-1 when defending.

hope we win guys...! milan has finally been playing quite a decent game so hope we can win and build that confidence for upcoming game and athletico

Official 11:
Abbiati; Abate, Rami, Bonera, Urby; NDJ, Monto; Taarabt, Poli, Kaka; Pazzini

Can't say i'm not surprised

We didn't play too bad tbh...

Robinho and Emanuelson were dreadful, Saponara was terrible barring that good cross near the end that Robinho somehow managed to miss.

Lack of fitness (we dropped off way too much in the second half) and Rami's header killed us.

ACMRox wrote:We didn't play too bad tbh...

Robinho and Emanuelson were dreadful, Saponara was terrible barring that good cross near the end that Robinho somehow managed to miss.

Lack of fitness (we dropped off way too much in the second half) and Rami's header killed us.

agreed. was also disappointed with honda but he is type of player who is not fast from before.

emanuelson cross was always at buffon 90% of the time.

but seedorf made this team play great game we had created load of chances, we only didnt finish and it came to haunt us.

and i understand saponara hasnt got enough game to prove himself but i hope he starts to capitalize chances like this.... it wont come again more often for him

it took rami's mistake and special goal for juve to win but i m proud what i saw of milan... but they now need to work on finishing. its same story as atletico. great game lack of finish.

and i m glad that despite rami's mistake he has been really solid. i cant wait next season, because rami really needs a good partner.

montolivo put a tremendous performance today, and i wished he put performance like this all the time or atleast in game of importance like this lol

and poli industrial performance, and didnt let pirlo play his game and was offering a lot in attack

taarabt kaka pazzini all did well, especially when it came to controlling and creating chances but they all lacked finshing.

de jong and montolivo was very effective in this game, and i like how poli dropped occassionally and helped them out.


we need new players for sure to iron out some problems but i think we are on right track. milan are playing a whole lot better under seedorf