Set Milan's Wide Roles Before the Lecce Team Sheet

The team sheet cannot draw a passing lane

Start Christian Pulisic? Restore Adrien Rabiot? After Milan's 0-2 defeat to Benfica, the team sheet is the obvious argument at San Siro. Ruben Amorim offered a harder one. He said his players crowded together centrally while the flanks and runs behind went unused. Against Lecce on Sunday, the decision is not simply which names return. It is who holds the width, who runs beyond and who gets the space their movement creates.

Benfica scored in the 16th minute through Dodi Lukébakio and again in the 53rd through Jakub Kamiński. Milan's official report says the home side created chances and points to the incidents around the goals. There were chances: Filippo Terracciano made Anatoliy Trubin save from range, Ardon Jashari went close, Koni De Winter missed from nearby after the break and Christian Pulisic later tested the keeper twice. But isolated attempts do not amount to a reliably connected attack.

Nobody has to accuse Milan of lacking effort to question the route. Once Benfica blocked the central lane, where was the pass that moved a defender? A club with Milan's ambitions cannot rely on a difficult individual shot to answer that every week.

Why the obvious XI was not available

It is easy to point to the starting side and demand that Amorim simply restore the names who improved the previous match at Lazio. He made five changes from that game. Pulisic and Diego Moreira began on the bench; Luka Modrić and Adrien Rabiot did too. Milan were stronger after substitutions, and the crowd is entitled to ask why the side had to chase the game before it found more movement.

The coach supplied constraints that a fair verdict must include. He said Rabiot had only just completed his first 90 minutes, Pulisic was returning from injury, and Moreira had missed two days of training for personal reasons. None of that proves the starting team was ideal, but it makes an easy 'play all the stars' prescription irresponsible. A season is not managed by treating every available name as equally prepared for a full match.

That leaves a less theatrical question for Amorim: what could the starters have done differently? A rotated side may have less polish; it should not have to discover where the width is during the game. If a narrow attack can be cured only by one particular substitute, the instructions are arriving from the bench too late.

Benfica made the missing space visible

For the first goal, Kamiński advanced into space and Lukébakio carried across the edge before finishing. Milan's account describes the danger on the break; independent reporting was harsher about the resistance on that side. Benfica struck again just as Milan had begun the second half with more energy: El Karouani's cross found Kamiński in the six-yard area. The attacking problem cannot excuse the defending, and the defending cannot make the attacking question disappear.

Amorim acknowledged both parts: too many players clustered inside when Milan possessed it, and defensive positioning that made conceding especially costly for a side already struggling to create. That does not prove every Benfica chance followed a Milan positional error. It tells the coach which two jobs a proposed selection must cover: create a route around the block and keep enough protection when that route fails.

Gonçalo Ramos worked without enough useful service, according to Gazzetta's match analysis. He should not have to choose between staying near goal with no pass arriving and coming back to help manufacture one. That is a coaching problem before it becomes a striker's stat line.

The alternative is a role, not a name

Milan return to San Siro for Lecce on September 20, then face a longer international pause before their next Europa League game at Salzburg on October 15. The first date matters more to the supporters than any theoretical January solution. Amorim has days, not months, to make the team look as if it can create a chance without waiting for a defender to slip or a returning player to invent an escape.

That does not require a reckless sprint down both touchlines. It requires one wide player to hold the opponent's last line long enough for the inside player to receive facing forward, and another runner to threaten behind rather than crowd the same feet. Milan may choose different personnel against Lecce. The roles must be visible before the substitutes arrive.

The strongest case against alarm is that the European opener is only one match and Benfica are a formidable opponent. Milan had drawn with Juventus and Lazio in the league, and De Winter's miss could have altered Wednesday's second half. That objection cautions against declaring Amorim's project broken. It does not answer the role question, which can be tested in the next home fixture without pretending a 2-0 loss defines a season.

What San Siro can judge on Sunday

There is a difference between a manager accepting responsibility and a manager showing the ground what has changed. Amorim's public description of the problem was specific. Against Lecce, look at the first Milan recovery in the opponent's half. Does a runner immediately take a defender away from the central receiver? Is there a pass available outside, or does everybody return to the same narrow corridor? Those are observable answers even if the ball does not go in.

Personnel matters, and the unavailable minutes are real. But Milan cannot turn every difficult first half into a referendum on which star should have begun. The club's own match report says September still lacks a win. Against Lecce, the first pass into space outside the crowded centre will matter as much as any returning name: it will show whether Amorim has given the whole team an answer.