Allegri happy as Leao is scoring rather than ‘doing nice but less concrete things’

Rafael Leao received quite a lot of criticism after the Genoa clash, despite scoring the crucial equaliser, but Massimiliano Allegri has now come to the No.10’s aid. 

In the dying minutes of Thursday’s clash, it was Leao who found the back of the net with a nice header on a corner. Prior to that, however, he struggled massively with the 1v1s and general involvement in the game, as we highlighted in our ratings.

We were not the only ones to highlight the subpar performance either, with fans and newspapers all saying that Milan’s star should have done better. After all, the Rossoneri didn’t do enough in the final third and he was one of the reasons why.

Allegri defends Leao

When asked about Leao during his press conference earlier today, Allegri came to Leao’s aid by focusing on the positives. As he put it, he would rather see Leao score a goal and play poorly than not score a goal but have some nice 1v1 moments.

Leao is still physically limited. How is he?

“Leao is feeling better. He was much better in the second half, he was more active. He still has to find his optimal condition. It’s important for him that he’s starting to score goals. He’s much more relaxed, so he forgets about things that aren’t related to football matches. The important thing for a striker is to score goals.”

Photo by Marco Luzzani/Getty Images

On Leao again…

“About Leao, I meant that he’s maturing a lot during the game, so he’s becoming more concrete. He enjoys scoring goals more than doing nice but less concrete things,” he stated.