AC Milan will close the page as expected Stefano Pioli, the coach who offered him his 19th in 2022e title of Italian champion, unable this season to sublimate his team during major meetings.
“AC Milan and Stefano Pioli announce that they will not continue their collaboration next season”said AC Milan in a press release published on Friday.
AC Milan prepares for a new era
“AC Milan sincerely thanks Stefano Pioli and his staff for the five years spent at the helm of the first team, marked by an unforgettable scudetto and a consistent return to the most important European competitions”the text continues.
Pioli, 58, was initially under contract until June 2025.
This amicable separation paves the way for the arrival, according to the Italian press, of the Portuguese Paulo Fonseca who has just spent two seasons in the French Championship with Lille and who knows Serie A having coached AS Roma between 2019 and 2021.
Pioli will lead Milan one last time on Saturday at San Siro, in the 38e and last day of the Italian Championship against Salernitana, bottom red relegated to 2e division.
The Rossoneri will then fly to Australia to play a friendly match on May 31 against AS Roma in Perth, but apparently without Pioli.
Upon his return to Italy, the Lombard club, which will also record the departure of its top scorer, the Frenchman Olivier Giroud, recruited by Los Angeles FC, will enter a new era, notably under the direction of Zlatan Ibrahimovic in his role as advisor to the president and owner, the American Gerry Cardinale.
A sad month of April
Relentlessly criticized by the Milanese ultras, Pioli is paying cash for his team’s inability to respond during the most important matches this season.
It started in the fall in the Champions League, where Milan left the premier competition of European football in the group stage by finishing 3e behind Dortmund and Paris SG.
This was even more obvious during the month of April, with an elimination in the quarter-finals of the Europa League against Roma after two defeats (1-0 at San Siro and 2-1 at the Olympic Stadium) and a setback in the derby against Inter (2-1), synonymous with 20e coronation for his great rival.
In the league, AC Milan experienced a slump in the fall this season, which quickly took them out of the title race. The Rossoneri returned to the second step of the podium, 19 points behind Inter, thanks to the catastrophic return phase of Juve, who dismissed their coach Massimiliano Allegri last week.
Honorable record for Pioli
Pioli, a former defender with Parma and Juventus, made his name as a coach at mid-table clubs, before taking the reins of Lazio (2014-16), Inter (2016-17), Fiorentina (2017-19) and, since 2019, AC Milan.
Under his leadership, Milan won an Italian championship title (2022) and reached, in 2023, the last four of the Champions League where they fell to Inter.
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Pioli was initially scheduled to hold his traditional match eve press conference this Friday early in the afternoon but it was canceled, AC Milan announced shortly before the announcement of its coach’s upcoming departure.
