Fonseca urges Milan to improve and find balance

Paulo Fonseca has urged Milan to find a balance between defense and attack after showing several weaknesses in the last two matches.

Milan were toothless but defensively solid in a tough 0-0 home draw against Juventus last week, before suffering the opposite problem in a midweek 3-2 Champions League win over Slovan Bratislava.

After opening the scoring, the Italian team conceded twice and the match had a nerve-wracking end as their Slovak opponents pushed hard for the equalizer.

Milan is already ten points behind leader Napoli in Serie A, but still has a game in hand. Fonseca will be keen to find a solution to their problems when they face Empoli on Saturday.

“With Juve we were better organized, with Slovan better in transition. It seems to me that we improve in something, then other problems arise,” Fonseca told reporters.

But just because you win doesn't mean you should think everything is fine by closing your eyes to the problems. I can't close my eyes. We talked about the problems.

'It is important to work on the problem. We won [against Slovan]. Is everything okay? No. If we work on the problem we had in the game, the team will get a positive response.”

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Milan have just one win in their last four league games but have failed to score in their last two Serie A games at San Siro (D1 L1). They last remained without a win in three home games (run of four) between February and April 2021.

A home match against Empoli, with whom Milan have won six of their last seven Serie A meetings (D1), could help the Rossoneri close the gap to the top and build some momentum.

“It's not easy in Italy to be dominant, and it's not easy against Empoli,” Fonseca said.

“What we want is balance, to feel that the team is creating chances by having defensive security. In Bratislava, after the 0-1 score, there was a chance to dominate the match, but we conceded the equalizer and the team took it.”

Midfielder Youssouf Fofana, a key player in Milan's line-up, has four yellow cards and could face a one-match ban if he is shown a yellow card on Saturday, which would rule him out of an important trip to second-placed Atalanta next week.

Asked whether the Frenchman would be rested as a precaution, Fonseca said: “I can't take the risk of resting him because tomorrow is the most important match.

“I expect Fofana to play an intelligent game. If Fofana makes mistakes, he makes mistakes, but I expect the others not to make mistakes.”