For me the prevailing sentiment these last 6-7 weeks is that everything is finely balanced when it comes to Milan. The last 2 games were hugely frustrating but since that Udinese game—a game we should have won had it not been for Serie A officiating doing its thing—we have gathered 14 out of a possible 18. I know we have belaboured the refereeing point on here, but it’s unreasonable to expect this imperfect, young team to negotiate games like Torino and Bologna perfectly (for my money, we should have had a penalty against Torino because Theo was barged down). Especially, with 2 of our 3 more senior players perpetually on the sidelines.
That’s why refereeing errors have an outsized impact on this team. And the errors were scandalous against us—not just wrong. The “we should make up for errors by beating the Bolognas and Udineses of this league” isn’t really a persuasive argument. If this was Milan circa 2005, sure. Back then, a sedate Milan performance meant a 4-2 win. And those 2 goals against were probably refereeing errors. Currently, we can’t expect 3 goals to offset every shitty ref decision. And that too from players who are still cutting their teeth.
When we aren’t head and shoulders above our competition, refereeing errors can spoil a whole season for a young side whose margin of error is wafer thin.
It’s a shame. You can just about live with injuries, covid decimating the team. It’s harder to accept extraordinary refereeing errors, especially with VAR around.