Fiorentina-Milan: The Title Race Is Back on After Undeserved Win

With this somewhat undeserving win, the race for the title is now back on. Milan are just four points behind Inter, and with 13 games still to play, the title is up for grabs.

But, Milan was lucky. Very luck in fact.

Fiorentina were the better side all night. They had twice as many shots than Milan and twice as many were on target. If it were not for some truly world class saves by Christian Abbiati and the referee’s decision not to award Fiorentina a penalty, the outcome could have been very different for Milan.

Do not get me wrong, I am clearly delighted with this win. It has brought Milan back into the race for the title, and it will give the team more confidence to believe they can actually win it.

However, Milan’s performance in this game was poor and to come away with all three points, Milan have to consider themselves extremely lucky.

It was most worrying that Leo’s side failed to impose themselves in the game.

La Viola were in control of this match from the time they took the lead early in the first half through Gilardino; even after we equalised, we failed to take control of the match.  It was La Viola that went on the attack in search of the winner.

We failed to impose ourselves on the game because we lost the battle in midfield. It was Montolivo, Donadel, Vargas, and Marchionni that dominated the midfield and dictated the game while our midfield trio of Pirlo, Ambrosini, and Gattuso were simply no match.

Gattuso in particular had a poor game as did Ambrosini before being replaced by Flamini. With our two defensive midfielders struggling to dominate, Pirlo’s performance suffered.

Flamini was an improvement when he came on, but only by a little.

Milan have Ronaldinho to thank for once again providing the assists for both of their goals.

Ronaldinho is such a superb talent, there is really no one else like him. Milan relies on him to make things happen—perhaps a little too much.

Though it is great to see Ronaldinho providing so many assists, it will be problem if we start relying on the Brazilian magician too much.  I feel this may already be the case since no one else on the team shares the burden of creating goals.

In all competitions this season, Ronaldinho has provided 14 assists. Seedorf and Pirlo are both far behind the Brazilian with just four assists each.

Creating goals has become the sole burden of Ronaldinho. This is a problem.

At full back, both Abate and Bonera came out second best in their respective duels with Vargas and Marchionni. Vargas was a constant threat down the left flank as was Marchionni down the right flank.

Vargas is an exceptional talent and I would love to see him don a Milan shirt in the future. He would be ideal for our problem at left back. Abate struggled to contain the Peruvian, but I do not think that Abate did all that bad.

Bonera on the other hand should have done better in containing the threat of Marchionni. Marchionni is not in the same class as Vargas and Bonera is more capable defensively than Abate.

Up front, Borriello had a frustrating night and was not his usual workmanlike self. He did not run and hustle as he did in Bari over the weekend, and he barely got sight of the goal, let alone a chance to score.

As for Huntelaar, the Dutchman showed his true predatory instincts.

Before Huntelaar's arrival, Milan had not registered one shot on target, yet Huntelaar’s first shot was not only on target, but it leveled the teams again.

There is no doubt that when provided with the service, the Dutchmen will not disappoint. He just needs the service. There is no doubting the Dutchman’s abilities, but his problem is that withough a service, he becomes almost completely anonymous.

Special mentions are also deserving for Abbiati, who single-handedly kept Milan in the game with a string of world class saves, and of course Pato, who scored the winning goal.

Although I believe our growing reliance on Ronaldinho is becoming a problem, our biggest problem is in midfield.

Last night we lost the battle in midfield because the legs of Gattuso simply couldn't sustain a high level throughout such a busy match schedule.

Pirlo, too, can no longer perform at the highest level week-in, week-out. But, it is his dependency on being played alongside able defensive midfielders that impacts his performance more than anything else.

Like Gattuso, Ambrosini also displayed signs that he can no longer consistently perform at the highest level.

To Milan fans, all this comes as no surprise, but it is a real concern. Given Milan’s busy match schedule, playing these players week in and week out is what will be our undoing.

While Beckham and Flamini are alternative options, Beckham simply is not a substitute for either Gattuso or Ambrosini and Flamini does not have the quality despite having the youth.

Juggling players in order to keep legs fresh will be Leo’s biggest challenge now, and in the coming weeks.