It was an extraordinary match, as Bologna had two men sent off, fought back from 2-0 down to draw 2-2, until an Ismael Bennacer volley and Zlatan Ibrahimovic cancelling out his own goal gave Milan victory.
Ibrahimovic was available for his first start of the season, but Franck Kessie, Ante Rebic and Pietro Pellegrini joined Mike Maignan, Alessandro Florenzi and Junior Messias on the treatment table, while Theo Hernandez and Brahim Diaz tested positive for COVID. The hosts missed Kevin Bonifazi, but had Gary Medel back.
Ciprian Tatarusanu was caught out by an early corner, but Marko Arnautovic nodded wide of the back post, but Lukasz Skorupski almost paid for some suicidal goalkeeping when sprinting outside the box to anticipate Rafael Leao with a diving header.
Moments later, Milan did break through, as Leao ran onto Ibrahimovic’s assist and his strike took a massive deflection off Gary Medel to wrongfoot Skorupski at the near top corner.
It went from bad to worse for Bologna, as they went down to 10 men when Adama Soumaoro tripped Rade Krunic from behind just outside the box. It was considered the denial of a clear scoring opportunity, although arguably Krunic was not going to get on the end of that Simon Kjaer through ball.
Milan doubled their lead when a Samu Castillejo half-volley was charged down and Ibrahimovic laid it off for Davide Calabria to hit a rocket that not even Nico Dominguez on the line could keep out.
Castillejo went off with a hamstring injury at half-time and Bologna got back into it, as an in-swinging Dominguez corner glanced off Ibrahimovic’s head at the near post to wrong-foot Tatarusanu.
Barely three minutes later, it was incredibly 2-2, as Musa Barrow sprung the offside trap on an intelligent Roberto Soriano ball rolled across from the right, with Calabria asking for the flag rather than chasing him down.
There was another twist to the tale, as moments later Soriano was shown a straight red card for his horribly high tackle that stamped on Fode Ballo-Toure’s ankle. After viewing it on VAR, the referee opted for the dismissal, reducing Bologna to nine men.
Olivier Giroud almost got the winner for Milan, but Skorupski made a remarkable save to palm the header off the line at the far post on Calabria’s cross.
However, Tatarusanu also rushed off his line to deny Arnautovic, whose heavy touch ruined a great give-and-go attack with Mattias Svanberg.
The Rossoneri restored their lead in the final minutes with a sensational bit of skill, as a Tiemoue Bakayoko cross was cleared to the edge of the area, where Ismael Bennacer waited for it to come down and hit a ferocious low left-foot volley into the near bottom corner.
It still wasn’t over, as Bennacer surged forward and laid it off for Ibrahimovic, who took one touch before passing it into the far corner with the inside of the right boot from the edge of the area.
Bologna 2-4 Milan
Leao 16 (M), Calabria 35 (M), Ibrahimovic og 49 (B), Barrow 52 (B), Bennacer 84 (M), Ibrahimovic 90 (M)
Sent off: Soumaoro 20 (B), Soriano 58 (B)
What a game!
The performances are getting worse. There was no excuse for struggling so much against 9 and 10 men.
Bologna were winning every second ball. And Milan’s play was so slow and unnecessarily complicated. When Bologna went down to 9 we didn’t even try and stretch the play.
We kept going through the middle.
We were incredibly lucky.
Injuries are not an excuse since it was the attitude of the players out there. And the one with one of the worst attitudes was Ibra. He was slow, took too many touches, didn’t chase, didn’t take up the right positions, was taking throw ins when he should’ve been in the box for a cross, and was generally a disgrace.
Had anyone else put in a performance like that they’d be off. It’s not good enough. They all need to pull their collective fingers out and regain the focus.
Milan were shocking. Besides Bennacer no one deserves a ratingf above 5. Bologna deserved a draw at least – they outplayed us with 10 men & at times with 9 men too. Since before the international break we been getting worse. i thought the break would halt the slide but sadly not. injuries are no excuse. The attitude, mentality, focus & sharpness is not there. If it was just 1 or 2 players, we can call them out but when its the majority of the team, we have to call in to question the coaching, prep & rehab odf the players. Not good enough. I cant remeber the last time a win felt like a loss. i am fuming!