Coppa final offers Milan faint glimmer of hope after dismal season
By Brian Homewood
(Reuters) - The Coppa Italia final offers AC Milan a faint chance of redemption after another dismal season of failure, and the prospect of claiming their first piece of silverware since 2011.
But they will have to beat an almost impregnable Juventus side, who are aiming to complete their second league-and-cup-double in a row, to do it.
Milan, who will miss out on European competition for a third season in a row unless they win on Saturday, have performed so badly on the pitch that their president has threatened to stop paying the players's wages.
Juventus, on the other hand, have just won their fifth successive league title, thanks to a run of 26 wins in 27 matches.
Having promised to invest in young Italian players, Milan's transfer policy has instead left them with a motley assortment of ageing journeymen.
Inevitably, it was coach Sinisa Mihajlovic who carried the can. He was fired in April after nine months in the hot seat and replaced by Cristian Brocchi, who has fared no better and is also expected to lose his job if his side don't beat Juventus.
Brocchi, who has won two out six games in charge, was left fuming after watching his side slump to a 3-1 home defeat by Roma in their final Serie A game last Saturday.
It meant a seventh-placed finish, the third season in a row the seven-times European champions have ended up outside the top six.
"I don’t accept that a team which wears such a prestigious shirt can play like we did on Saturday,” said Brocchi in a
television interview. "If we go into the Coppa Italia final with the same spirit then we can forget about it."
Club president Silvio Berlusconi was filmed threatening not to pay the players if they did not improve.
"If we keep playing like that, I will not pay you any more," he said. "You can trying suing me, although a civil court case in Italy takes eight years."
The only way to lend a positive note to the season would be to beat Juventus on Saturday, although even then it would only be papering over the cracks.
As Coppa Italia winners, Milan would then go into the Europa League. Juventus have already qualified for the Champions League, so a win for them on Saturday would open up another Europa League place which would go to sixth-placed Sassuolo.
"I hope that there’s something there that these lads can pull out," said Brocchi. "There would be no better time to do that than in a final in which many of them have never had the opportunity to play”
(Writing by Brian Homewood; Editing by Richard Balmforth)