Picking a Possible AC Milan 1st Starting XI Under Sinisa Mihajlovic

Preseason training began anew for AC Milan on Friday. It was the first time Sinisa Mihajlovic took to the training ground as the team's manager and the start of the long process to find out who will fill out the teamsheet when the season starts at the end of August.

It's Mihajlovic's job to get the team back into European competition. To do that he's going to have to come up with the right combination of players to compete with the likes of Napoli, Roma, Fiorentina and Juventus.

Preseason training and games will give him the clearest ideas. The flux that is the transfer window can obviously change any predictions at this point, as will Mihajlovic's ideas of what formation best suits the players at his disposal.

For this article, we will suppose that the Serbian will stick to the 4-3-1-2 formation he deployed for most of the second half of the season at Sampdoria. The players considered are those listed on the roster page of the club's official web site.

Who will be the 11 men on the field when Milan kicks off the 2015-16 season? Maybe they'll be the following players.

Goalkeeper

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Lopez was the best player on Milan's roster last year.

If there is one stone-cold lock on this team, it's that Diego Lopez will be starting in goal.

Lopez was Milan's best player last season. If not for his performance between the sticks, Milan would have finished even lower than 10th.

Lopez will almost certainly be backed up by veteran Christian Abbiati, who renewed his contract with the team earlier this summer.

Fans can rest easy with Lopez as the team's last line of defense.

Defense

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Paletta performed well when he came to the Rossoneri in the winter.

Here's the tricky part.

Milan's defense has been its biggest weakness since the sale of Thiago Silva in 2012. Indeed, the team's back line has been culpable for every failure in the three years since.

The center-backs have been the biggest failures. The team still lacks a standout in the center, but the situation is no longer deplorable.

Younger players such as Rodrigo Ely and players such as Cristian Zapata, who had been marginalized under Filippo Inzaghi, can certainly play their way into first-team contention this summer. But right now, the best pairing on the roster is that of Alex and Gabriel Paletta.

Two seasons ago, Paletta had the best season of any center-back in Serie A. He didn't have the same success last term, but it's worth remembering he spent the majority of the first half of the year on the injury list. Milan benefitted from the impending demise of Parma when they snatched him up extremely cheaply in February.

He acted as a stabilizing agent in the middle, bringing a technique absent among the likes of Daniele Bonera and a calmness alien to Philippe Mexes. He's not a superstar, but he's as steady as can be, and Milan will benefit from his presence.

As for Alex, he's older and can get burned if a pacy player manages to get in behind him, but the Brazilian is difficult to break down on the dribble and is generally a rock if he keeps the play in front of him. Eventually, Milan needs to upgrade this unit, but Paletta and Alex are palatable for now.

As for the full-backs, it's a fairly set situation. Ignazio Abate is the likely starter on the right, with potential pressure from Mattia De Sciglio, who needs to have a bounce-back year. On the left should be another winter signing from last season, Luca Antonelli, who excelled after arriving from Genoa before an injury shelved him late in the season.

Midfield

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De Jong's contract renewal was an unexpected plus.

The deeper part of the midfield is a fairly straightforward call.

Riccardo Montolivo's three seasons Milan have been mostly a disappointment. Last year, he was unable to recover from a broken leg he suffered in a friendly shortly before the World Cup and only played 10 times.

He is, however, the player on the roster best suited to the regista role in a 4-3-1-2, and he is the club captain, so he's likely to be on the field.

Flanking him will be a surprising returnee. Nigel de Jong was expected to move elsewhere when his contract expired this summer, but he pleasantly surprised Milan's fans when he signed a new deal with the team before his previous deal ran out on June 30. The Dutch hard man will play the role of Gennaro Gattuso while Montolivo plays as a poor man's Andrea Pirlo, giving the Italian cover while he tries to create in the middle.

On the other side will be €20 million signing Andrea Bertolacci. The 24-year-old scored six goals and notched eight assists at Genoa last season. He's as hard-nosed as De Jong and can hold his own at both ends of the field. He's a lighter version of Claudio Marchisio and could prove to be a valuable piece as a box-to-box midfielder.

Determining the link between those three and the strikers isn't as cut and dried.

The best two candidates aren't listed as midfielders on Milan's web site—rather as forwards. But make no mistake, both Keisuke Honda and Simone Verdi are truly attacking mids.

Honda's talents were wasted on the wing in Inzaghi's inflexible 4-3-3 last season. He belongs in the middle of the field, behind the strikers, where his creativity and passing ability can provide the final piece of quality a scoring move needs.

Another potential candidate for that position is Verdi, the 22-year-old who impressed under Maurizio Sarri at Empoli last season. Now fully Milan's property after resolving a co-ownership agreement with Torino, the talented trequartista could be a key block in the Rossoneri's rebuilding efforts.

Milan has had a chequered past when it comes to blooding their younger players, but they would do well to change that and allow Verdi to play his way into the lineup.

At the end of the day, it's probably going to be the more experienced Honda on opening day, but expect Verdi to make inroads before the year is out.

Forward

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Bacca (in red) led Sevilla to consecutive Europa League titles.

Milan has made two high-profile acquisitions on the forward line this season. Luiz Adriano has left Shakhtar Donetsk for the San Siro. Milan also sealed a deal with Sevilla for Carlos Bacca, pending a medical.

It remains to be seen whether the two of them will be able to play together. Frankly, it may not even matter. Bacca, whose deal will cost €30 million, will almost certainly be in the starting lineup, but it might be better to pair him with another player.

Two years ago, Alessio Cerci played the best season of his career as a seconda punta paired with Ciro Immobile at Torino.

When he did feature, Cerci played as a winger last year, but history has shown that isn't where he's at his best. His style would be a nice contrast to Bacca and pull defenders out of position, creating space for the Colombian to exploit.

Paired with an upper-level striker such as Bacca, Cerci could reclaim the form he showed in his last campaign in Turin, when he scored 13 times and added 10 assists. He's the man who should complete Mihajlovic's lineup up front.