When the VAR controlled the intervention on Gimenez, Fofana kept the ball for a long time, before handing it over to the Portuguese. The coach: “I told him to shoot.” A way, also, to certify Rafa’s importance and restore trust in him
For a few minutes, while the VAR room checked and rechecked Parisi’s intervention in the area on Gimenez, then sending Marinelli to the monitor, Fofana held the ball in his hands. While the whole stadium remained with bated breath awaiting the verdict – so, penalty or not? -, the number 19 was placed stationary on the spot. And that same stadium asked itself, traveling with its imagination to the next scene: so, if so, will he shoot? A question that has meandered along the three rings of the Meazza, and it is understandable: Milan came from Pulisic’s mistake against Juve and, more generally, from one score quite bleak from the spot. The fear of seeing another opposing goalkeeper celebrate was palpable.
little experience
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Also because the Rossoneri fans have some recent slips by the Frenchman near the goal imprinted in their minds. However, when Marinelli pointed to the disk, everything was accomplished and everything was revealed. Quick meeting between Fofana and Leao, and the ball passed into Rafa’s hands. Those who were already imagining ugly scenes like last year in Florence, in the match where penalties were stolen, have calmed down. Maybe not entirely, if he had time to read the Portuguese’s statistics from eleven metres. Statistics basicsince Rafa has never been a penalty taker. If we exclude the one made in the infinite soap opera with Rio Ave, it was the first time in the Rossoneri shirt. For the rest, few traces: one mistake in the senior national team, a couple that were successful in the youth selections. Level of experience from the spot: low. Now, however, Allegri knows he has an extra shooter because Rafa’s penalty was impeccable. And it is the coach himself, after the match, who explains why he went to kick. “There was no confusion about the penalty, I told Leao to shoot: he had tried them during the week and they went well.” So there are two cases, thinking back to that ball under Fofana’s arm: either Allegri instructed Leao immediately after the penalty was made official, or the Frenchman “protected” the ball from any opponent attempts to unnerve the penalty taker. The doubt remains but one thing is certain: Leao took Milan back, but Allegri – who as usual looked the other way at the moment of the penalty – gave him a good hand to return to the center of the Rossoneri world. We are back in the era of the carrot.
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