Milan take a 4-2 lead into the second leg of this Europa League Round of 16, but it was a real struggle against 10-man Slavia Praha and far from a good performance.
The Rossoneri were only still missing Tommaso Pobega, so fielded almost a full-strength XI against a Slavia Praha side who topped their Europa League group ahead of Roma, winning all but one of their games. Stanislav Tecl, Bolu Ogungbayi, Sheriff Sinyan and David Pech are ineligible, with Christos Zafeiris, Ondrej Kolar and Petr Sevcik injured.
See how it unfolded on the Liveblog.
Alessandro Florenzi was booked within 100 seconds and will be suspended for the second leg, then Florenzi’s free kick landed on the roof of the net.
The home defence was twice caught out and let off the hook by El Hadji Malick Diouf and David Doudera scuffing their finishes from promising positions down the left.
However, Slavia Praha went down to 10 men after just 26 minutes when Diouf was shown a straight red card for going studs-up late into Christian Pulisic’s ankle.
Milan took the lead somewhat against the run of play, as Rafael Leao cut inside down the left and whipped a cross to the back post for the Olivier Giroud header.
However, moments later Matteo Gabbia’s error sparked a dangerous counter-attack, forcing Simon Kjaer into a desperate block. The resulting corner was only cleared to the edge of the area by Tijjani Reijnders, finding Doudera for a spectacular right-foot volley into the far top corner to equalise.
Leao saw his header saved and on the resulting corner Jindrich Stanek incredibly managed to fingertip a Gabbia header off the line.
Milan managed to take the lead approaching half-time with a double-whammy from corners. First Florenzi took it short to the edge of the area for a Reijnders scorcher with his right foot.
Then moments later, after David Zima had intercepted the Leao assist for Giroud, another Florenzi corner found a Ruben Loftus-Cheek free header for 3-1.
After the restart, Rafael Leao flashed a shot across the face of goal to skim the far post, but Slavia Praha down to 10 men got another goal back.
A Provod free kick found Ivan Schranz at the far post for a ferocious strike across Mike Maignan, as Milan again defended sluggishly.
The 10 men nearly equalised on 79 minutes after a Kjaer howler, as Schranz was unable to make the most of it.
Instead, Rafael Leao went on a solo slalom through Slavia Praha defenders and thought he had scored with the dinked finish from the tightest of angles, but Pulisic got the final touch right on the line.
Milan 4-2 Slavia Praha
Giroud 34 (M), Doudera 36 (S), Reijnders 44 (M), Loftus-Cheek 45 (M), Schranz 65 (S), Pulisic 85 (M)
Sent off: Diouf 26 (S)
Player statistic
| Alessandro Florenzi |  |
2' | ||
| 26' |  |
El Hadji Malick Diouf | ||
| Olivier Giroud |  |
34' | ||
| 36' | |
David Doudera | ||
| Tijjani Reijnders (Assist: Alessandro Florenzi) |
|
44' | ||
| Ruben Loftus-Cheek (Assist: Alessandro Florenzi) |
|
45+1' |
| 65' | |
Ivan Schranz | ||
| Davide Calabria | |
72' | ||
| Christian Pulisic (Assist: Rafael Leão) |
|
85' |
Match statistic
Draw the 2nd 45 mins vs a team down to ten men since the 26th minute. Abysmal display.
The day Ancelotti left, it was the day ww lost the so-called UCL DNA & became a banter club. Sad but true.