Monza 1-1 Milan (5-6 pens): Rossoneri beat Palladino's side on penalties

AC Milan needed a penalty shoot-out to beat Monza in a friendly on Tuesday night at the U-Power Stadium. 

Match Report

In what was a dull affair overall, Christian Pulisic scored Milan’s only goal of the game but it was very quickly ruled out by Andrea Colpani in the first half.

There was a sombre feel to the U-Power Stadium ahead of kick off as there was a rendition of Nessun Dorma by three singers on the pitch which was followed by a speech from Adriano Galliani about his friend and colleague, Silvio Berlusconi.

The game was the first Trofeo Berlusconi, being organised after his passing earlier in the year. Berlusconi owned both Milan and Monza during his life, with Galliani by his side at both.

The action began in a fairly tepid manner, as was to be expected given the occasion. There was some busy work from new players Tijjani Reijnders and Christian Pulisic.

The early sights on goal for Milan came from an Olivier Giroud overhead kick that failed to get near the goal, and a good shot from distance by Rafael Leao that produced a low save out of Michele Di Gregorio.

Despite that, it was Mike Maignan who was soon called into an impressive double save as a shot from close range came in from Andrea Colpani, and there was a follow-up from range to save.

Monza were forced into an early change as Davide Bettella suffered an injury inside 20 minutes. That led to former Inter defender Danilo D’Ambrosio coming on for his first Monza appearance.

Milan continued to apply the pressure and it paid after half an hour when the busy Pulisic was brought down inside the box after a smart one-two with Olivier Giroud. The American stepped up to take the penalty but saw his shot saved. He was able to sweep in the rebound though.

That made it seem as though the floodgates were about to open, but after a flurry of activity in the Monza box, it was actually Raffaelle Palladino’s side that scored. Some very poor defending from Milan allowed Colpani the space in the box to score past Maignan.

Milan were not particularly perturbed by being pegged back and continued to apply pressure on the Monza goal for the rest of the first half. Both Leao and Hernandez came close to scoring, with the former working Di Gregorio.

Much of the positive play in the second half for Milan was coming down the left flank, where Hernandez and Leao clearly had the pace advantage on the Monza defence.

The match hit a lull around the hour mark with neither side managing to produce too much, and Stefano Pioli opting not to make any changes too swiftly.

A decent opening finally came in the 66th minute as Gianluca Caprari almost put Monza ahead with a low shot from the edge of the box, but Maignan got across well and palmed it away.

It took until the 79th minute for Pioli to make any changes to his Milan side, given the team is playing another friendly against Trento tomorrow. That will almost certainly feature an entirely different starting eleven.

The changes first saw Pulisic and Hernandez come on for Samuel Chukwueze and Davide Bartesaghi. Leao and Giroud then came off a minute later for Noah Okafor and Lorenzo Colombo.

Giroud appeared to have some physical discomfort as he came off and was receiving some attention on the bench.

The second half was summed up late on when Reijnders took a free-kick from close range and blazed it way over the bar at a seemingly impossible angle.

The 90 minutes ended 1-1, with very little action of note in the second half. That meant the game went straight to penalties.

Reijnders dispatched the first penalty for Milan but Andrea Petagna soon equalised. Okafor then netted for Milan, with Caprari making it 2-2.

Tomori scored his penalty, and was followed by Machin who also scored despite Maignan going to right way. Loftus-Cheek was next and he also scored, putting Milan 4-3 up. Franco Carboni made it 4-4.

Colombo dispatched his penalty, so the pressure was on Pessina to score and he did, making it 5-5. Going into sudden-death, Thiaw made it 6-5. Birindelli then hit the bar to ensure that Milan won 6-5.

Line-ups

Monza XI: Caldirola, Mirko Maric, Gagliardini, Pessina, Patrick Ciurria, Davide Bettella, Dany Mota, Michele Di Gregorio, Carlos Augusto, Andrea Colpani, Andrea Carboni

Subs: D'Ambrosio, Eugenio Lamanna, Mari, Caprari, Petagna, G. Kyriakopoulos, Stefano Gori, Pedro Pereira, José Machín, Samuele Birindelli, Giorgio Cittadini, Warren Bondo, Franco Carboni, Samuele Vignato, Valentín Carboni

Milan XI: Giroud, Maignan, Loftus-Cheek, Krunic, Tomori, Theo, Pulisic, Tijjani Reijnders, Leao, Malick Thiaw, Kalulu

Subs: Kjaer, Mirante, Florenzi, Sportiello, Samuel Chukwueze, Tommaso Pobega, Yacine Adli, Noah Okafor, Yunus Musah, Lorenzo Colombo, Luka Romero, Jan-Carlo Simic, Davide Bartesaghi, Kevin Zeroli