The Rossoneri had Theo Hernandez and Fikayo Tomori back from bans, but Davide Calabria and Yunus Musah were suspended, with Mike Maignan, Ruben Loftus-Cheek, Simon Kjaer and Luka Jovic injured. Albert Gudmundsson did not make the trip with flu symptoms, left behind with Ruslan Malinovskyi, Mattia Bani, Alan Matturro and former Milan man Junior Messias.
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It took just three minutes for Tomori on his comeback to clumsily bring down Alessandro Vogliacco in the box, so with usually penalty taker Gudmundsson out, Mateo Retegui converted by sending Marco Sportiello the wrong way, ending his 70-day goal drought.
Christian Pulisic was unlucky on 13 minutes to see his right-foot curler bounce off the far post, while Tijjani Reijnders drilled wide and Johan Vasquez made a decisive tackle on Samuel Chukwueze.
Morten Frendrup also swept a first-time finish just wide of the far post for Genoa, then Rafael Leao failed to make the most of a Koni De Winter error with a deflected finish into the arms of Josep Martinez.
The goalkeeper made two great saves in under a minute, first fingertipping the Pulisic strike out of the far top corner, then parrying the Theo Hernandez header on the resulting corner.
Milan equalised on the stroke of half-time, as Alessandro Florenzi was still up after a free kick was cleared and therefore nobody was marking him for the free header from four yards on a Chukwueze cross. Florenzi had not scored in Serie A since May 8 2022 against Verona, a gap of 728 days.
However, Genoa restored their advantage when sluggish defending on a long ball first saw the Morten Frendrup shot charged down, then Vogliacco’s cross found Ekuban for a towering header over Matteo Gabbia.
Chukwueze had the ball in the net moments later from a tight angle, but had made the run too early and was caught offside.
Martinez punched a dangerous Chukwueze cross off the head of Olivier Giroud, while Theo Hernandez went on a classic run from his own half only to aim a weak finish straight at the goalkeeper.
Milan’s form was on show at the 69th minute when Noah Okafor, replacing a jeered Leao, rolled across only for Giroud to dink it wide of the open goal one-on-one with Martinez.
They did manage to draw level, as Florenzi’s corner found Gabbia for a header off the ground into the far bottom corner for 2-2.
Incredibly, they turned it around three minutes later, as Giroud missed the sitter, but scored a far more difficult left-foot volley from a tight angle on the Pulisic cross.
It was not enough to stop the protest, as after sitting in silence for 80 minutes, the entire Curva Sud walked out with 10 minutes to go, leaving only a banner that read: ‘The sound of silence.’
They therefore missed Milan conceding a comical third goal, as Morten Thorsby rolled across from the right, it ricocheted off Tomori, Malick Thiaw and Retegui to bundle over the line. The Lega Serie A gave it as a Thiaw own goal.
Theo Hernandez could’ve scored the goal of the season, but his volley was just off target.
Source – Serie A | Milan 3-3 Genoa: Strange thriller at San Siro (football-italia.net)
