Champions League: the bad evening of Giroud and Maignan, singled out in Milan

A match to forget. Far from the euphoria of last November 7, the evening of AC Milan's success (2-1) against PSG, Olivier Giroud and Mike Maignan experienced a nightmare at San Siro this Tuesday. Opposed to Borussia Dortmund during the 5th day of the Champions League, the two French people and their Rossoneri teammates lost heavily with a score of 1-3. Here they are last in group F, two points behind PSG (2nd) but tied with Newcastle (3rd) where they will go in two weeks for the outcome of the group stage. If qualification for the round of 16 remains possible, the setback against BVB, now qualified, risks being costly. Giroud and Maignan, leaders at both ends of the field, failed and did not escape criticism from the Italian press this morning.

In C1, the details often make the difference. And every opportunity must be seized. In the 6th minute, the French striker opened the scoring with his left foot from the penalty spot. But Dortmund goalkeeper Gregor Kobel rejected his too-timid attempt. A negative turning point for AC Milan, who found themselves trailing five minutes later after Marco Reus' goal, who was effective in this same penalty exercise. “Big mistakes and lack of confidence: Giroud's bad evening,” headlined the Gazzetta dello Sport this Wednesday, harsh on the top scorer in the history of the France team (56 goals). “The negative protagonist of the evening was Olivier Giroud, the man of big matches, who was rather lacking against the yellows and blacks.”

Ineffective like his team, which scored 17 times on goal, the former Arsenal player received a rating of 4.5/10 from Sky Sport, which named him “worst” player of the match. "He failed. The error strongly affects him for the rest of the game,” noted Corriere dello Sport. Prolific in Serie A (7 goals and 3 assists in 11 days) and decisive against PSG, Giroud missed his appointment. The Milan veteran (37 years old) shares the criticism of the transalpine newspapers with his compatriot Mike Maignan, guilty of a hand fault on the third German achievement scored by Karim Adeyemi.

The French goalkeeper, also placed in the “flops” category, is going through a difficult period like the entire Milanese collective. “It was a very negative evening. Once they were in the lead, they did what they wanted, reacted AC Milan coach Stefano Pioli after the defeat conceded to Dortmund. We created a lot but we didn't know how to take advantage of the opportunities when we could have taken the advantage, then we struggled against a team who were ruthless in the restart, when the level rose (…) It’s a shame because we could have scored a few more goals.”

With only five points taken from the last five league matches, the Rossoneri find themselves on the verge of crisis and risk elimination from all European competition. To avoid this failure, they will have to pull out all the stops in Newcastle on December 13. The proud reaction of Giroud and Maignan, touched but undoubtedly not sunk, will be eagerly awaited.