Lazio – Milan Serie A Week 29

Milan beat Inter in the derby courtesy of an unexpected source. Estupinan smashed the ball into the net leaving Yann Sommer surprised and frozen. Allegri’s tactical tweaks taking advantage of the wide areas – occupied by Luis Henrique especially – paid off. The gap to first place and Inter was reduced to seven points. The prevailing feeling is that Inter’s march towards the scudetto is still intact.

Some feared that Rabiot might get a yellow during week 27’s visit to Cremonese and miss the derby. It of course didn’t happen. The Frenchman did get the yellow versus Inter however. The midfield needs to be tweaked to accommodate for the suspension but thankfully two capable players are available. Ricci or Jashari will start in Rabiot’s place. It seems that Allegri will stick to the derby goal scorer leaving the returning Bartesaghi on the bench for this match at least. The rest of the lineup is likely to remain the same as well. De Winter in particular has grown a lot and looks more than capable of being a starter in Gabbia’s absence. Tomori and Pavlovic are playing well enough and have helped the team keep the ball out of the back of the net. Milan now lead the Serie A in fewest goals allowed with 20. The other injured player, Loftus-Cheek, will need few more weeks to recover from the jaw fracture but Gabbia could be ready to return later this month or perhaps after the international break. Pulisic and Leao both continue to look less than 100% but are likely to start over Nkunku and Fullkrug. Latest whisper about the latter is that Milan may not exercise the cheap €5 million option after all. A bigger spending summer is anticipated or at least hoped. This should include a higher profile center forward instead of the German.

Alessio Romagnoli is likely to miss this match with a calf issue. Lazio have one Serie A win since the end of January and sit in the middle of the Serie A table.

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