Ahead of AC Milan’s clash against Lazio, Paulo Fonseca spoke to the media and explained his somewhat surprising starting XI decisions. He made it clear that form is important, which is something that Theo Hernandez and Rafael Leao are lacking.
Many were surprised to see the predicted XIs this morning as Hernandez and Leao were both left out. While they were far from brilliant last time out, few still expected Fonseca to drop them from the starting XI but this decision was confirmed earlier.
This led to several questions about the duo and the reasoning for their absences, with neither believed to be suffering from an injury. Furthermore, it has led fans to question Fonseca’s bottle, so to speak, to drop two of his star players in a game which could be monumental.
Before the fixture, Fonseca spoke to DAZN about the reasoning behind the decisions, whilst also offering some insight into the decision to start new signing Tammy Abraham from the bench – his words have been relayed by Milan News.
On the exclusions of Theo and Leao…
“Maybe people see this as a punishment but it will never be like that. It is a choice for what we need. Theo is not physically well, I spoke to them and they understood. We need to make choices that are the best for the team. We have to be a team today if we want to win. And my choice is according to the moment of the players, the team and what we need.”
On the work during the week…
“We have the awareness of what we need to be as a team. As I said, we all agree on what to improve. Today we want to play a good game also defensively, which is the part where we have to improve the most. We also worked tactically to make better decisions.”
Abraham starting from the bench…
“Normally I don’t bring players who arrive on the day of the game or the day before, but we are in a special situation. Luka [Jovic] is injured, and Tammy has been training all the time. We’ll see now if we need him or not. He is ready to help the team”
