AC Milan’s European night against Benfica was meant to offer a first sign of a new direction. Instead, before a San Siro crowd of 65,000, it left the club with another layer of disappointment to carry into Sunday’s Serie A meeting with Lecce.
The Rossoneri had reached the Europa League rather than the Champions League after last season, but the appetite for continental football had still filled the stadium. What followed did not match the expectation around a side rebuilt during the summer, nor the ideas that had brought Ruben Amorim to Milan. Gerry Cardinale watched from New York and will return to the city in time to be back in the stands for Lecce.
Cardinale had backed Amorim after a wide search for a new coach, convinced by the Portuguese manager’s age and his intention to create a bolder Milan. The project was built around possession, authority over matches, aggressive football and the pursuit of one more goal rather than merely avoiding one. It was a deliberate break from the previous 2025-26 campaign, which had left the owner sufficiently dissatisfied to demand a major change.
That change has been supported not only with an expensive transfer campaign but with Cardinale’s personal presence around the team. He has attended every match bar two, and there is no suggestion that the Benfica setback has altered his confidence in the coach after only five games and one defeat. Their post-match contact treated the performance seriously, but without turning it into a crisis.
Lecce as the next test of calm
Amorim remains secure in his position, but Milan require an immediate response. The visit of Lecce is the opening chance to restore some balance before an intense period that will test the group’s progress. Between the October and November international breaks, Milan will play nine times, with five fixtures away from home and matches arriving every three days across Serie A and the Europa League.
- Sassuolo away and Salzburg away
- Atalanta at San Siro
- Bournemouth away, followed by Udinese away
- Bologna at home, then the derby
- Ferencvaros at home and Genoa away
Amorim accepted the scale of the task when he chose Milan after his spell at Manchester United. Yet the pressure around the club has weighed on him. He has spoken publicly of the noise made by his critics, and after the Europa League defeat he was the last person to leave San Siro. He returned alone to Milanello and spent the night reflecting before welcoming the squad back for training. There are no senior club figures with whom he can debate strictly tactical matters.
The coach intends to shield a group containing players only marginally younger than himself. Luka Modric, who was unable to help Milan on the European night, is the same age as Amorim: 41. The manager has no intention of retreating from a challenge he accepted only months ago, especially after the work of the first two months had produced victories over Torino and Venezia.
He has acknowledged that the team stepped backwards against Benfica, both in the quality of its football and its competitive energy. Those are the areas he will address in the days before Lecce, while trying to remove the visible tension and nervousness that affected the side during the cup match. Amorim has repeatedly stressed the need for serenity, and knows that results are the quickest route towards it.
“Time is bought by winning matches,” has been his central message. Milan may need weeks for the wider transformation to take hold, but the immediate requirement is simpler: beat Lecce and enter the three-week league break with a lighter mood.
Adrien Rabiot is expected to return to the starting side, while Christian Pulisic should also be restored after limited recent involvement left him, in Amorim’s words, “angry”. Milan can continue to pursue the high line, controlled passing and attacking intent that defined the new coach’s plan, but the coming fixtures may also demand temporary adjustments: a less adventurous team, perhaps, but one capable of offering the stability required to win individual battles while the larger project takes shape.
