MILAN, Jan 12 — Sergio Conceicao’s AC Milan flopped on the new coach’s San Siro debut after the seven-time European champions could only draw 1-1 with struggling Cagliari in Serie A yesterday, while Juventus’s spiky derby with Torino ended 1-1.
Portuguese Conceicao immediately got fans onside by beating Inter Milan in a thrilling Italian Super Cup final in Saudi Arabia, but the pre-match cheers at the trophy soon turned into more familiar boos and groans for an insipid display.
“I’ve been a coach for 13 years, and given the quality of the players I have the first half today might have been the worst I’ve ever seen,” said Conceicao to Sky.
“The second half was better, even if we messed up 25 times in front of goal... Drawing today is like losing because we’ve lost two points.”
An unusual error from Mike Maignan gave Cagliari a point, the France goalkeeper allowing Nadir Zortea’s weak, speculative shot to escape his grasp nine minutes after half-time.
Zortea’s soft leveller sucked away all the enthusiasm generated moments before when Alvaro Morata bundled home after Christian Pulisic was denied by Cagliari goalkeeper Elia Caprile and the base of the post.
Milan stay eighth and eight points behind fourth-placed Lazio who sit in the final Champions League spot, although Conceicao’s team play one of their two games in hand at Como on Tuesday.
The hosts were as poor as they often were under Conceicao’s sacked predecessor Paulo Fonseca but would have come away with the points had it not been for slack finishing and excellent goalkeeping from Caprile who stopped Pulisic and Tammy Abraham netting when clean through on goal.
‘Be more aggressive’
Nikola Vlasic earned a point for Torino, who haven’t beaten their local rivals for a decade, with a superb strike which crashed in off the post in stoppage time at the end of a first half that started with Juve going ahead through Kenan Yildiz in the eighth minute.
Thiago Motta’s team remain unbeaten in Italy’s top flight this season, but yesterday’s draw was their 12th of the league campaign and left them three points away from the Champions League positions.
Fifth-placed Juve have now drawn six of their last seven Serie A matches and have key clashes with Atalanta and Milan coming up next week.
“Once we went ahead we sat back and they created dangerous situations just by chucking the ball into our area,” said Motta to DAZN.
“We need to be more aggressive, we didn’t do enough with our attacking moves to win the match.”
A frantic evening at the Stadio Olimpico Grande Torino finished with coaches Motta and Paolo Vanoli both being sent off following a pitchside scuffle 10 minutes after the break.
Motta, who responded to Vanoli exploding with rage at what he thought was a red-card worthy foul on Yann Karamoh, will be suspended for Juve’s game in hand at title contenders Atalanta on Tuesday evening.
Atalanta underwhelm
Atalanta would have moved above league leaders Napoli, who host Verona today, on goal difference with a win at Udinese but were held to a goalless draw after a sub-par display.
The stalemate means Inter Milan can take second place from Atalanta if the reigning champions win at Venezia this afternoon as a three-way title race hots up.
Atalanta, gunning for their first ever Serie A title, created very little in Udine and were lucky not to be beaten by the spirited hosts, who should have taken the lead on the stroke of half-time.
Alexis Sanchez hit the woodwork twice within a matter of moments right before the break, first with a header before smashing the rebound against the bar.
“They were better than us, more intense than us. We struggled the whole first half and were lucky,” said Atalanta coach Gian Piero Gasperini to DAZN.
Nikola Krstovic boosted Lecce’s survival hopes with a brace in a 3-1 win at Empoli which moved Marco Giampaolo’s team two points above the relegation zone. — AFP
