AC Milan duo Mike Maignan and Ruben Loftus-Cheek are reportedly set to miss our Serie A encounter with Genoa this weekend.
After sustaining an issue in the warm-up, Maignan missed our goalless draw at Juventus this past weekend, while Loftus-Cheek was withdrawn in the 82nd minute of the encounter in Turin.
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Although Milan have already secured Champions League football for next season, amid significant speculation over his future, Stefano Pioli will want to finish the season as positively as possible as his tenure looks to be coming to an end.
In order to do that, he would ideally have as close to a fully-fit squad at his disposal as possible, but he could be without two more key players this weekend when Genoa visit the San Siro.
As per MilanNews, both Maignan and Loftus-Cheek underwent further tests on Monday, and the scans showed that the pair had both sustained muscle injuries, and they are now expected to be reevaluated next week.
That in turn would see them sidelined for the weekend, with La Gazzetta dello Sport subsequently ruling them out of their expected Milan XI on Sunday.
After earning the Man of the Match award last time out, Marco Sportiello will no doubt deputise for Maignan between the posts again, while Ismael Bennacer could return to the Rossoneri starting line-up and be deployed in an advanced role to cover the absence of Loftus-Cheek.
It remains to be seen what Pioli goes with, but as noted above, with Champions League football for next season already secured, it will be interesting to see if the Milan boss experiments and perhaps gives some of his youngsters a bigger opportunity to impress between now and the end of the campaign.
Milan have lacked inspiration and quality arguably for most of the season, which in turn has led to the expected decision to replace Pioli in the summer. Hopefully, with the pressure off to an extent, we’ll see better performances in the coming weeks to finish the year with a flourish.