PIOLI: "THE DERBY IS A GAME YOU PLAY TO WIN"

Today is no ordinary day. Tomorrow, at 20:45 CET at San Siro, our second Derby of the season against Inter kicks off. Before announcing his squad for tomorrow’s game, Coach Stefano Pioli gave his pre-match thoughts in today’s press conference at Milanello, broadcast live on the AC Milan Official App in Italian and English, as well as on Milan TV in Italian.

CURRENT FORM FOR BOTH TEAMS
“Inter did much better than us up until December, but we’re doing well now and we’re climbing back up the table. We prepare for every game with the aim of winning, but there are some games like this which are simply worth more. And in order to win you need to play better than your opponents. I don’t know the distance between us and them right now, we’re facing a side who haven’t lost for a long time. We’ll all need to have Ibra’s mentality tomorrow: we’ll need to be fired up and excited at the prospect of the game. Our team have shown character and courage, we’ve had more bad times than good, and we’ve reacted in the right way.”

IBRA’S CONDITION
“Zlatan has been completing an individual programme in order to be ready to rejoin the team in training today, if he passes this final step then he’ll be available for tomorrow evening. We’ve done everything we could to help him recover from the flu and his calf problem, he just needs one more full training session with the team.”

ONE DAY TO GO
“When you prepare for these matches you do so aiming to win. We have great respect for our opponents but we’re also in good form. We’ll have to overcome difficulties during the match but we need to have confidence and believe in our own capabilities. We’re creating a lot of chances but we have to improve our cohesion in both phases, especially when we’re in possession. We know what we need to do, it’s really important for us to display our idea of football from the beginning until the very end. The fact that we haven’t won a Derby match for a long time in Serie A provides extra motivation: we’re feeling good and want to go for it.”

THE OPPOSITION
“The best part about my job is studying the opposition’s characteristics and taking into consideration the qualities they have. We’ve prepared for the match and have a strategy, Inter play in a distinct fashion. We’re aiming to be compact and dangerous, irrespective of the choices made by our opponents. We need to do well in terms of seizing the opportunity.”

INDIVIDUALS
"Leão and Rebić can play together, we’ll see tomorrow. I’ll select the players with characteristics best suited to the game, while I’ll also look to have the possibility of bringing on options from the bench so I can make changes during the game. The only player who is still struggling is Krunić, everyone else should be available.” 
 

Check out all of the tickets available for our upcoming matches at singletickets.acmilan.com!