How Montella's system can help Bacca hurt Inter in Milan Derby
AC Milan fans will be hopeful ahead of this weekend’s Derby della Madonnina.
Their optimism has a lot to do with rival Inter’s major struggles, the Nerazzurri having fired Frank De Boer and replaced him with Stefano Pioli.
The fact that they operate with one of the league’s most dangerous attacking trios, with Suso, M’Baye Niang and Carlos Bacca.
There’s more, namely the struggles Inter’s defences have had, something which should surely help Bacca get back in the goals. The 30-year-old hasn’t netted since the start of October, when he helped Milan complete a shocking comeback against Sassuolo.
There’s more, however: the way Coach Vincenzo Montella has his wingers tuck inside, not to mention have his box-to-box men make diagonal runs, tends to confuse defences, force a centre-back to step out… and frees up Bacca.
Bacca’s six Serie A strikes represent 32% of Milan’s goals from open play. Take a look at the graph below, taken from the 1-0 win over Juventus:
Inter, for their part, can’t rely on their slow full-backs, whose difficulties often end up drawing out a central defender, as can be seen from the image below, taken from the 2-1 defeat to Roma. Though it’s hard to speculate following a Coaching change, it could be hard for Inter to correct their flaws so quickly.
There’s more good news for AC Milan: midfielder Jack Bonaventura has adapted to Montella’s system, played the most minutes (1044 minutes in the league) among the outfield players… and participated in 50% of the attacks that have led to goals.
Moreover, he’s already netted four goals in eight games against Inter… albeit as an Atalanta player.
