5 AC Milan Players Whose Stock Tumbled in 2015-16 Season
For AC Milan, the 2015-16 season was one of mediocrity. Failure to qualify for continental competition was a huge blow to the club, especially after a pre-season defined by heavy spending and grand ambitions.
The Rossoneri underwhelmed as a team throughout much of the campaign; even when they won, the football they played was far from enthralling. And, while the two coaches who oversaw those collective displays—Sinisa Mihajlovic and Cristian Brocchi—are for the most part responsible for that, certain players didn’t help.
Some individuals, such as Giacomo Bonaventura, Gianluigi Donnarumma, Ignazio Abate, Luca Antonelli, Juraj Kucka and Carlos Bacca, can be proud of their displays. Others, such as Alex and Keisuke Honda, can at least be credited for doing what was expected of them.
However, there were a select few who categorically failed to live up to expectations.
Here Bleacher Report takes a look at five Milan players whose stock went downhill in 2015-16.
Luiz Adriano
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Arriving from Shakhtar Donetsk last summer for a £6 million fee, Luiz Adriano was expected to form a potent strike partnership with Carlos Bacca this season. However, while his Colombian team-mate adapted well to life in Serie A, the Brazilian struggled, scoring just four goals in 26 league appearances.
The early signs were promising. He brought pace, power and an aerial threat to the team, giving Milan a more direct outlet when needed. But his lack of a clinical touch saw him lose his first-team place early and, by January, he was reported to be on his way to China, per Goal.
That move fell through in the end, but Adriano continued to offer work rate without any real productivity. By the end of the season, he was used mainly as a substitute, brought on to stretch tired opposition defences late in games.
Andrea Bertolacci
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During his time at Genoa, Andrea Bertolacci showed himself to be a crisp passer with a creative flair that few other central midfielders in Serie A seemed to possess. Those qualities intrigued Milan enough for the club to splash £15 million on the 25-year-old’s signature, but he didn’t live up to the transfer fee in his maiden campaign at the San Siro.
In games against Torino and Lazio in the first half of the season, there were brief signs that he would bring the sort of verve the Rossoneri otherwise lacked in midfield, but a succession of injuries and disparate performances saw his confidence take a tumble.
During the 2014-15 campaign, he scored six and assisted eight goals. Per WhoScored.com he also averaged 43.6 passes per game, with 1.4 key passes. In Bertolacci’s first season with Milan, however, all of those statistics went down; he scored and assisted one goal apiece while averaging just 35.6 passes with less than one key pass per game.
In the last home game of the term, a 3-1 defeat to AS Roma, he was taken off after just 57 minutes and was jeered by his own fans as he made his way to the bench. And, after failing to make a real impact at club level, he lost his place in the Italy squad ahead of Euro 2016.
Mattia De Sciglio
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For Mattia De Sciglio, 2015-16 was yet another season of missed opportunity. Since breaking through at Milan three years ago, the 23-year-old has struggled to live up to his early billing, and this term his descent continued as he was relegated to the substitutes’ bench.
With Ignazio Abate sealing the right-back berth and Luca Antonelli establishing himself as the club’s first-choice left-back, the youngster, who can play in either position, only started 21 Serie A fixtures. In addition to that, his place in the squad was further threatened by the emergence of 19-year-old Davide Calabria.
De Sciglio played without purpose in a season where his confidence was evidently low. He seemed nervy and tentative when venturing forward, while his distribution was less than assured. However, in spite of his poor displays, there has been persistent speculation that Juventus and Bayern Munich are interested in the player, per Calciomercato.
According to Squawka.com, he completed markedly less take-ons per 90 minutes than either Abate or Antonelli. He also made less successful passes and won fewer tackles, meaning that all in all he was relatively ineffective when compared to his team-mates.
The days of De Sciglio being a prospect are over. And, if he continues to show signs of not fulfilling his once-great promise, it will be hard to imagine a future for him with Milan.
Diego Lopez
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In 2014-15, Diego Lopez was one of Milan’s best players. The goalkeeper, who signed from Real Madrid, proved himself a solid shot stopper and a consistent performer, providing an element of stability to an otherwise shaky back line.
Unfortunately, at the beginning of 2015-16, the Spaniard seemed to be suffering from a spot of nervousness. He looked jittery and failed to keep a single clean sheet in the first eight league games of the campaign.
The 1-1 draw with Torino at the Stadio Olimpico would prove to be Lopez’s last outing of the season. His positioning was askew as he allowed Daniele Baselli to beat him at his near post for the Granata’s equaliser before picking up a yellow card in the game’s dying stages.
In the aftermath to that performance, he was dropped and replaced by 17-year-old Gianluigi Donnarumma, who would see out this term as Milan’s first-choice goalkeeper with a series of match-saving displays, showcasing greater decision-making, reflexes and composure than his more experienced team-mate.
Lopez clearly didn’t see eye to eye with then-coach Mihajlovic, something he recently discussed with MilanNews (h/t Forza Italian Football):
"We all expected more with Mihajlovic’s arrival but things continued to go badly. I’m still stunned by how he behaved, he acted strangely in relation to me a lot of times.
He didn’t show me much respect and I don’t know what he was trying to do, but it was all very strange to me.
Football is sometimes like that though and regardless, Donnarumma deserves to be the starting goalkeeper.
"
Following his displacement, Lopez was then injured for almost three months. And, by the time he returned to fitness in March, he was completely out of the first-team picture.
Jeremy Menez
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Jeremy Menez was Milan’s top scorer in 2014-15, but he failed to replicate that form this season. In fairness, he did spend the entirety of the first half of the campaign out with a hip problem, but when back in the side he failed to add cutting edge to the attack.
The Frenchman didn’t showcase any of the capricious, chaotic runs and streak of individualistic audacity that previously characterised his play, and he was far less effective as a result; per WhoScored, he completed just 0.3 dribbles per game, made 0.6 key passes and didn’t contribute a single assist in 10 Serie A outings.
On top of his injury woes, his attitude came under scrutiny. During the draw away to Lazio in March he showed indiscipline when asked to come off the substitutes’ bench. According to La Gazzetta dello Sport (h/t Football Italia), he had to be persuaded by Mihajlovic’s assistant manager, Nenad Sakic, who reportedly told him, “There's still a quarter of an hour to go, not just one minute.”
In a year where much of Milan’s attacking play was staid and ineffective, they would undoubtedly have been aided by the 2014-15 version of Menez’s refined dribbling skills, willingness to take on his marker and finishing touch. Unfortunately, none of those traits were in evidence during his brief outings this season.
All transfer fees cited in this post were provided by Transfermarkt.
