Milan on its knees. Disastrous Sunday in the shadow of the Madonnina, with Inter and Milan defeated and forced to deal with their respective failures. This is the case for the Nerazzurri, beaten by Turin and now out of the Champions League fight, and the same goes for the Rossoneri, who came away with broken bones from the away match in Bergamo. Inter made the most noise, if only because the goal of third place, at least until yesterday, still seemed possible.
Instead, a real disaster happened at San Siro: the 1-2 suffered by Turin, barring sensational twists, certifies farewell to dreams of glory. Crazy match, full of twists and questionable episodes, which will make noise throughout the week. Taking the lead thanks to a (very fiscal) penalty scored by Icardi (17'), the Nerazzurri were put back together by a courageous and indomitable Bull, perhaps the best of the season.
Some key decisions by referee Guida weigh on the match: to the penalty given to Inter (the touch with Moretti's arm seems involuntary), we must add the expulsion of Miranda (the second yellow card is correct, the first is very dubious) and the penalty, with relative expulsion of Nagatomo, granted to Belotti, appeared completely invented.
“The match was decided by the episodes, these things only happen against us – Mancini's poisoned comment. – To tell the truth, there wasn't even our penalty but it's difficult to comment on a match like this, unfair things have happened. In any case, we should have closed it earlier, we could have scored at least two goals but this is precisely our problem”.
Yes, because after a good first half ended Inter in the lead could have doubled, instead they let themselves be attacked by a regenerated Turin from the interval. The grenades first equalized with Molinaro (55'), then took the lead with Belotti (73') in the aforementioned penalty episode. At that point, down by a goal and with two men down, the nerazzurri were no longer able to raise their heads and suffered a very heavy defeat, probably decisive for the race for third place.
Very dark climate also at Milan and not only for the sad passing of Cesare Maldini, who died in the night between Saturday and Sunday and loudly honored by all of Italian football. The team took care of making the weekend even more black, beaten in Bergamo by an Atalanta now out of the relegation fight. A defeat that literally enraged the club and the coach, the umpteenth flop of a disappointing season, hanging only on the final of the Italian Cup on May 21st.
“We're going to retreat until next Saturday – thundered Mihajlovic. – We scored 2 points in 4 games against teams behind us, this is not acceptable. I warned Galliani, who heard Berlusconi: the club is in agreement with me, it's time to retire until the match against Juve. There is no malice, we lose all the contrasts: now we will look at each other and we will bring out the attributes, if there are any ".
A real explosion, in full Sinisa style: a character that was not reflected in the least on the team, except in a few sporadic episodes. The usual Milan was seen again yesterday, unable to raise their voice in the presence of an Atalanta that is anything but invincible. And to think that the match in Bergamo had gone quite well: in the 4th minute Rocchi whistled a penalty for Paletta's arm and Luiz Adriano brought his team up to 0-1.
It looked like a good Milan, then, as often happened this season, the light went out at the first difficulties. In the 44th minute Pinilla showed the house specialty again: a wonderful bicycle kick and Atalanta equalised. The start of the second half was clearly a Nerazzurri one and Gomez's goal (63') was just the logical consequence of what we saw on the pitch. In the final Milan tried to react with the entrances of Balotelli and Menez but did not go beyond some insidious free-kick, thus returning home (indeed, in training camp) with yet another disappointment.
