AC Milan ‘the week ahead’ Ancelotti

By European Football
April 17 2005

First on the title run in neck and neck with Juventus in one of the most thrilling run ins around Europe at the moment Ancelotti stated:

'We are enthusiastic and want to do well. The duel with Juve is still wide open never mind that they are out of the Cup. The top-of-the-table clash comes after an important European semi-final. If we do well against PSV then we will have a further motive to take on the Bianconeri with renewed enthusiasm. Will a play-off decide the title? I don’t think so.'

Then turning to the game with Siena:

'The game comes in a week particular for the championship; a lot of things can be decided. We are expecting three difficult weeks. I can say fundamental. The two games against Inter in the Champions League can take a lot of out of you physically but in a positive sense they were good psychologically. Milan are in good shape, we didn’t play well in the second half but I think that our advantage gave us the feeling that it secure enough. The first-leg game was played the way be wanted to. Not we have to look to improve our play and not make any errors.

We will go into the Siena game, looking as always, to play our game, we are enthusiastic, have good morale and we know what counts this week. [Andrea] Pirlo won’t play but we can do well without him. Another player with his own characteristics will play, which will of course, be different from Andrea. Our objective is get to as many as points as possible from these three games, we want nine points but we aren’t making any calculations.

[Jon Dahl] Tomasson has a problem with his back and has not been called up. I might be an idea to play with just one striker as Sheva is not too well. He didn’t train today after taking a knock to his calf. We hope we will recover in time for tomorrow. If he doesn’t then we’ll have to try another system. I have decided yet on the line-up.

[Jaap] Stam will probably play on the right, Kaladze definitely on the left. One of the defenders will sit out, but Maldini is fine. Rui Costa will probably take the place of Pirlo or we could play with one attacker and three attacking midfielders. Siena are a solid side that have drawn a lot games. They have plenty of good players of which Chiesa is the best known as I coached him for two years. We have a lot of player’s just one game away from a suspension but we can’t start making calculations. We’ll see what happens. It seems pretty positive for us and not so for the others but we still have a month to decide the outcome of everything. We have a good possibility but the next games are fundamental. We have to keep going the way we have. The worry is not to arrive at out target and we know little incidents can change everything but we have to overcome that with hard work.

And to the story of the week in which Milan were unwilling participants Ancelotti had this to say:

'The law is right but it has to be applied with good sense. It’s a new law and it has to be understood so a little time is needed and I repeat, good sense is needed. As for Inter having to play behind closed doors for four games, I don’t know if it is right but considering how UEFA behave in these cases then Inter came out of it well enough. It probably wouldn’t have been right to have given a greater ban.'

And for PSV: 'The Dutch side deserved to go through. They are a tough side; they have good players who look to play well together. It will be very difficult but we are just thinking about the league at the moment.'