Soccer

Serie A: Milan beat Tottenham in UCL last 16

Serie A: Milan beat Tottenham in UCL last 16

Brahim Diaz sank the early winning goal to give Milan an advantage in the UCL last 16 outing over Tottenham. For more Serie A news here!

Milan defeated Tottenham Hotspur for the first time in European competition throughout their five meetings. This is also their first victory in the last 10 matches against an English club (D1 L8), the last time was a 4-0 thrashing against Arsenal in 2012 Champions League. Follow for accurate soccer prediction this Champions League week here!

Stefano Pioli’s men did not disappoint and lightened up the San Siro stadium after a less than ten-minute goal gave the Italian Champions a lead that they held on throughout the 90 minutes match and kept Spurs with limited chances.

Theo Hernandez started the quest for the winning goal as he beat Cristian Romero to a one-on-one via high-ball and immediately fired a shot but Fraser Forster blocked the chance. Brahim Diaz to the rescue as he came thundering for the rebound, he dived for the ball via header and nudged the ball over the line.

Despite lack of dynamics and poor communications, the Hotspur still pressed the Serie A champion and limited their campaigns in the second half, sadly they didn’t convert begun by Ttarusanu denied Son a chance for an equalizer before the ball bounce to the direction of Harry Kane who had a wide chance but failed to hit the net and just hit the crossbar. 

The hosts nearly doubled the lead  and almost sent Tottenham into total graveyard when Rafael Leao’s cross was nodded by Olivier Giroud and went to Charles De Ketelaere’s path, but the Belgian international failed to deliver in the clutch time. It was quite obvious that Tottenham were having difficulties in finding their rhythm, especially their goalkeeper Fraser Forster who made his first Champions League appearance since December 2013.

Malick Thiaw of AC Milan, despite not scoring, made improvement and provided much-needed aids and was mandated to control the outcome of the match that led to the host maintaining their 1-0 lead and steal the first leg of the round of 16 of UEFA Champions League.

AC Milan Head Coach Stefano Pioli had nothing but high praise for the performance of his squad, “It wasn’t hard to prepare this game tactically, with all the duels, but I am very happy with how my players performed. We could have scored  a second goal – we had some clear chances. I am definitely happy with the performance but it’s only the first leg and the next game will surely be more difficult.”

Antonio Conte’s side became the first English club to lose four Champions League knockout stage games in a row since Arsenal while Milan is enjoying their first Champions League knockout victory since beating Barcelona in February 2013 in the last 16.

“I think it was better today with high intensity and I think we played against a good team and don’t forget Milan last season won the league in Italy. I think that to concede the first goal we can do much better. Instead we concede a goal after maybe only five minutes. Then we tried to lead the game and create situations to score but I think Milan defended very well. We created the chances to score but in the end we are talking about a defeat, a loss.”

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