Serie A | Milan 1-0 Verona: Gimenez magic revives Rossoneri

Milan struggled to break Verona down, but a moment of magic secured victory with Santiago Gimenez on the acrobatic Rafael Leao assist.

The Rossoneri remain frustratingly inconsistent, reaching the Coppa Italia semi-finals, but losing the Champions League play-off to Feyenoord. The second leg is on Tuesday, so Rafael Leao and Christian Pulisic were rested, with Fikayo Tomori suspended, Ruben Loftus-Cheek, Emerson Royal and Alessandro Florenzi injured. Verona had Daniele Ghilardi suspended, but Ondrej Duda returned from his ban after a 5-0 hammering by Atalanta, with Casper Tengstedt, Suat Serdar, Martin Frese and Abdou Harroui out of action.

See how it unfolded on the Liveblog.

Just days after the Mike Maignan howler in Rotterdam, the goalkeeper horribly fumbled a Duda strike and let it squirm over the bar in the opening 140 seconds.

Tijjani Reijnders forced a tricky save from Lorenzo Montipò at the near post, then the goalkeeper needed a one-handed push on the swerving Joao Felix cross-shot.

Santi Gimenez had the ball in the net with a precise snooker shot past the on-rushing ‘keeper, but only after wandering into an offside position.

Yunus Musah really should’ve put Milan in front during first half stoppages, but ballooned over on the Gimenez roll across.

Rafael Leao and Alex Jimenez came on for the restart, but the full-back was booked for shoving Duda and the Verona midfielder fortunate not to receive a second yellow card for the provocation.

Joao Felix went over under pressure from Toma Suslov and Rafael Leao had some attempts deflected, while Musah’s strike from the edge of the area skimmed the far top corner.

Milan finally broke the deadlock with a well-worked move. Alex Jimenez dinked up the ball from the edge of the area and Leao with a cushioned volley off the outside of the boot floated it over the defender and goalkeeper for Santiago Gimenez to nod in from point-blank range. It was the Mexico international’s second goal in as many Serie A games.

Milan 1-0 Verona

Gimenez 75 (M)

16

46′

28

46

19

14

29

68′

80

88′

46′

82′

1

42

12

84′

27

20

62′

33

9

68′

10

85′

38

31

84′

57

31

21

33

73

96

10

46′

20

46′

11

68′

90

82′

42

88′

5

22

34

15

4

7

72

14

8

62′

35

68′

80

84′

2

84′

85′