Lopetegui is Milan’s first choice for the bench, but Van Bommel and Tedesco are also among the options. What coaches are they? Alec Cordolcini explains it to us
The road seems clear. Unless there are second thoughts, perhaps following the fans’ revolt, the Milan he chose Julian Lopetegui as the new coach for the post Pegs. There would already be a draft agreement with the Spaniard on the basis of a three-year contract for 4 million. The feeling is that this week could be decisive for the definitive turning point, but in the meantime the candidatures of alternatives are also advancing.
Paulo Fonseca of Lille is among the strongest, as is that of Mark van Bommelvery close to Ibrahimovic. In addition to the current coach ofAntwerpwho has already announced his farewell at the end of the season, too Domenico Tedesco, coach of Belgium, ended up on the huge list of possible targets, less strong than the other two. To tell us about these two coaches is Alec Cordolcinijournalist and expert on Dutch and Belgian football.
“The Italian” Van Bommel
Mark van Bommel will leave Antwerp in June after a good run and seems to be among the coaches being looked after by Milan. What coach is he?
“Mark Van Bommel is a very “Italian” coach, in the sense that, as he himself said, among the many high-level experiences he has had in his career, and he said that he has learned almost everywhere from the coaches with whom he he worked, but that, in the end, the approach, the mentality that stuck with him the most were the ones he had in his experience in Milan.
In fact, with the title he won with Antwerp, we saw all this teaching, this legacy, because his has always been a football proposal that was very attentive to the defensive phase, therefore with a proposal of pragmatic, unspectacular football. , with the team often studying the opponent and acting as a throw-in, we can clearly define Van Bommel as a non-achieving coach, because he is a bit exaggerated, and in any case he could pass him off as someone who puts ten players behind the ball. No, it’s not like that, but he is certainly pragmatic.”
Do you think he is already ready for such an important leap or would he need another intermediate experience?
“Van Bommel’s trajectory started with PSV, he started well and then ran aground. He didn’t go well at Wolfsburg and then recovered at Antwerp. In my opinion there is one thing to underline: his flaw was not having a plan B. His PSV had a certain game plan, but when the teams began to understand it he became sterile, easy to contain. Therefore, precisely this difficulty in being able to change schemes, to change approach to face different challenges, caused his dismissal from PSV, which first coincided with a setback for the team and which then did not win precisely because it faded in the second phase of the season.
Against his opponent, however, he proved to be a coach who knew how to vary the score. In fact, he reached the play-off for the title, which is assigned there with a mini-group between the top six who compete against each other, a round-robin, where he demonstrated that he had not only given the identity to a I play for the team but also know how to manage pressure and know how to make the right decisions at the right times. So, him growing up as a coach, definitely yes. Then, you also have to deal with the fairly conservative mentality of Italian football, for which those arriving from outside always have to get used to it, there is always the doubt whether they will be ready or not, but if one is a good coach and has a clear idea and has solutions, I think it’s quite irrelevant that I haven’t had high level experiences. It is growing and may be worth the gamble.”
German and the Belgium project
Domenico Tedesco, the current Belgium coach, also ended up in the chaos of names. What kind of coach is he, if he is also ready for a place like Milan and if you think he could really leave the national team for the Rossoneri.
“Domenico Tedesco can be said to be a sort of anti-Van Bommel, in the sense, to make a joke, that he instead is a coach who has always changed a lot in terms of schemes, he defended with three, he defended with four, he tried the five-man midfield and so on. Both in Schalke, where he had returned a bit in the first leg of the so-called laptop trainers, that is, these coaches, who grew up mainly in Germany, starting with Klopp, then with a series of followers not so much from a tactical point of view but with regards to their particular career, that is, laptop technicians, because they were coaches who had never had a significant past as a footballer, so let’s say they had learned the trade not with experience on the field but by studying. Many of these have demonstrated that it is absolutely not a diminutive, on the contrary.
German both at Schalke and Leipzig, a somewhat unclear experience, he has proven to be a very flexible coach who always tries to adapt to situations. Now he has been called to Belgium with the task of rebuilding the national team after the golden generation. His name compared to Milan seems strange to me: he has a lot to do in Belgium to bring back such a talented and competitive team and he isn’t even halfway done and the European Championship is upon us.
Accepting Milan means getting fired, we have already seen in the past such as Lopetegui himself. It seems impractical and makes little sense to me, it’s as if he had thrown away months of work. No one is in people’s heads but it seems like a difficult road to travel. Even for Milan, having a coach who will only be available from mid-July, I don’t know how useful it will be from a renewal perspective.”
Lopetegui and the fans’ protest
Apparently, however, the name chosen by Milan is Lopetegui: what are your thoughts on this matter? The fans are up in arms on social media because they wanted Conte…
“Lopetegui can be a winning bet, he is a coach who I wouldn’t define as moody but he can be someone who falls into the right environment, if he finds the right feeling, he is certainly a coach who can give a lot. But at the same time, if the feeling with the environment, if that spark doesn’t strike immediately then it can really be a disaster with a coach who doesn’t take half measures precisely in this relational aspect.
Regarding the fans revolting, it is honestly something that makes me laugh because in any case I say that fortunately it is not the fans who decide the coach and who will lead the team, because I wonder how many of these who revolt and ask for Conte, because in in reality it is probably the only name they know, having ever seen Van Bommel’s, Tedesco’s, Lopetegui’s teams play. Then they can be coaches that you like or not, but I think that whoever makes a choice does so on the basis of knowledge and experience that the fans don’t have. These riots always make me smile, and this reheated soup mentality always makes me smile. Conte wouldn’t be for Milan because he has never coached them but I would still say this focus on the usual names is enough.”
Two talents from Belgium and Wieffer
From the bench to the transfer market: is there a player who particularly surprised you this season in Holland and Belgium that you would recommend to Milan?
“For a team like Milan you also need already established players. For the Netherlands I mention the name of Pavlidis, the AZ Alkmaar striker, because he is ready to move to another league. As a first striker he could be an ideal signing. He is not a static center forward, he would reconstitute a nice offensive line with Reijnders which worked very well at AZ last year. It could be an interesting operation even if he isn’t cheap because the price is worth a lot after two seasons of over twenty goals. In Belgium I was very intrigued by Amoura and Puertas, the couple from Union Saint-Gilloise. But it also depends on who Milan will be and what coach there will be. We saw the case of De Ketelaere, who did it with another coach and another style of play.”
There is always talk of a more positional and defensive midfielder for Milan: could that profile be Wieffer? How did his season go?
“I expected more from him. He had exponential growth last year, he almost went from Serie B to the national team in the space of just a few months. An elastic, defensive and physical midfielder, but who also has the offensive phase. He participates in the maneuver, kicks on goal and looks for space. What he does best is quantity but it’s not just that. In my opinion he has grown less than what was expected, I would have liked him to be more explosive and less reserved. His season was good, in line with that of Feyenoord, but some teammates including Timber asserted themselves more. He would need a third season in which he really made it clear what level he can aspire to.”
