Vincenzo Montella Can Bring Style and Substance to AC Milan

After weeks of uncertainty and speculation, AC Milan concluded their search for a new head coach on Wednesday morning by appointing Vincenzo Montella.

A statement on the decision, via the club’s official website, read as follows:

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Vincenzo has signed a two-year contract which begins on July 1. It is the belief of the club that the style of play of the new Rossoneri coach will be the basis of an important, fruitful and positive collaboration. Heartfelt thanks to Cristian Brocchi for the enthusiasm, preparation and intensity with which he approached his career as Milan coach with the Allievi, the Primavera and the first team.

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Montella enjoyed a fine career as a player, including a 10-year spell with Roma during which he found the net 100 times. He was nicknamed the Little Aeroplane for his goal celebration and won 20 caps for Italy.

His first break in coaching came with the Giallorossi’s under-15 side in 2009. Two years later he was appointed interim first-team coach following the resignation of Claudio Ranieri, sparking a brief upturn in results before the club decided to hire Luis Enrique.

Montella then moved on to Catania, enjoying a positive year with the Sicilian outfit before taking hold of the reins at Fiorentina. He spent three successful seasons with the Viola but was sacked last summer after comments he made about the club were deemed to be disrespectful.

At that point, in 2015, he was rumoured to be on Milan’s shortlist for their impending head coach vacancy, per Goal’s Peter Hanson.

The Rossoneri were in need of someone with an established reputation after failing to make progress under the inexperienced Clarence Seedorf and Filippo Inzaghi, but they eventually settled on Sinisa Mihajlovic. Montella ended up at Sampdoria.

But while Milan finally had a reputable coach at the helm last season, results barely improved and the football was dour.

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Mihajlovic brought with him his favoured 4-3-1-2 formation and an authoritative air, but the team’s play under his auspices was slow and unexciting. Subsequently, when the wins dried up, he was dismissed and replaced temporarily by former Primavera boss Brocchi.

Following the Serb’s dismissal, club president Silvio Berlusconi stated in a Facebook post (h/t Football Italia) that “Milan must return to a style of play and results worthy of our history.” Clearly the club wants aesthetic improvement as much as it needs moving up the Serie A table, and in this respect, Montella’s appointment makes perfect sense.

Fiorentina were one of the most entertaining teams in Italy last season under Paulo Sousa’s leadership, though it can be argued that the groundwork for their style was first laid down by the Portuguese’s predecessor.

During his three seasons with the Tuscan club, Montella implemented and refined a proactive, attacking style of play based on control of possession. He also showed versatility when it came to the shape of his team, utilising 3-4-3, 4-3-3 and 3-5-2 systems to good effect.

Viola Nation’s Chloe Beresford spoke to Bleacher Report about the coach’s methods with Fiorentina, saying:

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I think very highly of Montella. He’s great at uniting the squad, developing young players and is tactically flexible, often changing the formation midway through the match. His style of football was always free-flowing and easy on the eye. With Borja Valero the driving force in midfield, the team scored some stunning goals.

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Montella showed more of his tactical ideas with Sampdoria, where, after initial experiments with a 4-3-1-2 shape, he instituted a 3-4-2-1 which allowed him to make the most of his attacking midfield talents, including Joaquin Correa, Ricardo Alvarez and Roberto Soriano.

His short time with the Blucerchiati also evidenced glimpses of an innovative streak that was clear during his time at Fiorentina in multiple intriguing selection choices.

Montella played Joaquin as a wing-back, giving the Spaniard additional space to run into and exploit with his exceptional dribbling skill and crossing ability. He also occasionally used Josip Ilicic as a false nine, enabling the negation of the Slovenian’s unwillingness to track back and perform defensive duties and instead emphasising the player's technique and vision in attacking areas.

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Fundamentally, he is the sort of tactician that Milan have needed for quite some time: one who is unafraid to explore new ideas, alter the team shape and individual roles and proselytise about an intricate, short-passing, attack-minded approach to the game.

And although the Rossoneri played a more functional style under Mihajlovic and Brocchi’s respective tenures, there are some players in the squad who could be well suited to Montella’s methods.

While his distribution could be tidied up, 17-year-old goalkeeper Gianluigi Donnarumma is remarkably composed for his age and has shown willingness to be patient with the ball at feet. Alessio Romagnoli’s left foot is ideal for spraying passes out from defence to build play from deep, while full-backs Ignazio Abate, Mattia De Sciglio and Luca Antonelli are all comfortable when venturing forward.

In midfield, Riccardo Montolivo, Andrea Bertolacci, Manuel Locatelli and Giacomo Bonaventura are better on the ball than they are off it, and each possesses the flair, close control and passing range to flourish under Montella’s guidance. Meanwhile, up front, Carlos Bacca should relish playing in a more creative team where his sole responsibilities are to make intelligent runs and finish chances.

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For other players, the future may not be so bright. Cumbersome centre-back Cristian Zapata will not satisfy the need for assured buildup from the back, midfielders Juraj Kucka and Jose Mauri will need to provide more than their usual dynamism, while striker Luiz Adriano lacks the guile to lead the line effectively.

Undoubtedly, then, there is still a lot of work to do with the squad, but Montella has a knack for teambuilding. With Fiorentina, he had to deal with the constant sale of his best players; Montolivo and Matija Nastasic in 2012-13, Stevan Jovetic and Adem Ljajic in 2013-14, and Juan Cuadrado in 2014-15.

Despite the constant flight of talent, he assembled a team that not only played attractive football but won games. After finishing 13th the season prior to his arrival, Fiorentina finished fourth in Serie A in each of his three terms in the dugout. They also reached the Coppa Italia final in 2014 and the UEFA Europa League semi-finals in 2015.

Montella wasn’t able to achieve the same levels of success with Sampdoria, though that had more to do with his lack of time in the job. In addition, the club sold their top scorer Eder to Inter Milan in January, forcing the coach to once again re-jig his tactics.

In Milan, however, the 42-year-old looks to have found the sort of project he has been searching for since leaving Fiorentina.

According to La Repubblica (h/t Calciomercato), a Chinese consortium is set to acquire an 80 percent stake in the club, something that may lead to fresh investment. This could potentially enable spending money in the transfer market on players that fit the new coach’s philosophy, something he is not willing to compromise.

He discussed this in an interview with La Gazzetta dello Sport’s Alessio Da Ronch (h/t Gazzetta World), saying: "I don’t believe in formations, instead I look at strategies, and those can change. I believe in a philosophy as it is key to have one. You pick one and move forward with it, or else you will just create confusion…Continuity, in the long run, has its advantages."

Finally, after several years of false dawns, it appears that Milan have a coach with concrete ideals who they can trust not just to deliver results but an entertaining brand of football.