With a convincing 4-0 victory over Dinamo, Milan leaves Zagreb with only a home draw against RB Salzburg remaining to advance to the round of 16.
The Dinamo were undefeated in Zagreb after having defeated Chelsea 1-0 and holding RB Salzburg to a 1-1 draw, while the Rossoneri were aware that a loss here would eliminate them from contention for the Round of 16. Chelsea defeated RB Salzburg 2-1 today, thereby doing Milan a favour.
Fikayo Tomori was suspended, Mike Maignan, Sergino Dest, Davide Calabria, Alessandro Florenzi, Zlatan Ibrahimovic, and Alexis Saelemaekers were injured, Brahim Diaz was only able to sit on the bench. Yacine Adli, Malick Thiaw, Aster Vranckx, and Tiemoue Bakayoko were ineligible, and there were numerous other absences.
After nine minutes, Simon Kjaer’s volley had beat the goalkeeper, but Dino Peric made a crucial save from six yards away.
When Sadegh Moharrami headed in a cross from Mislav Orsic, Matteo Gabbia did the same, and Ciprian Tatarusanu stopped a Luka Ivanusec shot with his gloves.
With Pierre Kalulu’s help, Olivier Giroud’s header was palmed away, but Sandro Tonali’s free kick to the back post and Gabbia’s diving header finally broke the scoreless tie.
Milan has created enough opportunities to be the rightful leaders at halftime, despite the fact that they went without the ball for a while and had to withstand a brief burst of danger in the middle of the half. Given their extensive injury list and Dinamo’s unbeatable home record, the Rossoneri have performed admirably, with Rebic providing a lively presence throughout. Although Dinamo still poses a serious threat to a shaky Milan defence and will not back down easily, their hosts will be disappointed they couldn’t maintain some early momentum.
After the restart, De Ketelaere attempted a counterattack and forced an important Peric block, but Rafael Leao doubled Milan’s lead with a run from midfield and rode a shoddy attempted tackle to complete the move himself.
Although Tonali was pulled down by Ljubicic for a penalty following the Rebic back-heel flick, which Giroud blown into the roof of the net.
Ivanusec’s shot at the near bottom corner was parried by Tatarusanu, while Giroud’s half-volley was acrobatically fingertipped off.
Rafael Leao drove down the left and pulled back for the fourth goal; Giroud missed it; Ljubicic anticipated Rebic; and in doing so, he unintentionally tipped it into his own goal.
Tommaso Pobega’s goal was disallowed because Divock Origi was offside when he assisted Orsic’s curling shot, which missed the outside of the far post. When clear on goal, Rade Krunic was then stopped by a fingertip save.
After a first half that was fairly evenly matched, in which Milan took a small lead into the locker room, Dinamo’s collapse in the second half allowed their visitors to romp to a convincing victory in Zagreb. The Croatian champions, who are so rarely defeated at home, were repeatedly split wide open, but several saves from Livakovic kept the defeat’s margin from growing. The Rossoneri have now won three games in a row overall, and they are in a good position to leave Group E next week.
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