As we close 2020, who's in your best 11 for Milan for this decade, 2011-2020? I'm talking best 11 in terms of overall contribution to the club on the field over the last 10 years. Given the club's lack of success lately, it's kind of difficult to think about. It would be interesting to see who the top players were in terms of appearances, goals, etc. for this period. There's been so much turnover and so few outstanding players that this is probably tougher than it would be for previous decades.
Here's my Milan Best 11 2011-2020: GK - Gigio Donnarumma 186 appearances D - Alessio Romagnoli 171 apps, 7 goals D - Cristian Zapata 111 apps, 3 g D - Ignacio Abate 213 apps, 3 g D - Davide Calabria 93 apps, 3 g M - Jack Bonaventura 147 apps, 30 g M - Franck Kessie 115 apps, 19 g M - Hakan Calhanoglu 111 apps, 18 g F - Suso 120 apps, 21 g F - Carlos Bacca 70 apps, 31 g F - Zlatan Ibrahimovic 85 apps, 62 g So in a massive effort to avoid doing any actual work today, I went through the league statistics for Milan on Soccerway from 2010-11 through the current season. We have had 97 players who have appeared in at least 10 league games in any of those seasons. There were 389 league games played in this period. From the 97 players on the initial list, I cut everyone who hasn't played at least 50 games as a minimum for consideration. That left me a list of 36 players from which to pick my Best 11. From there, I sorted the 36 into positions (GK, D, M, F) and by number of appearances. If there was a tie for appearances, I ranked by goals scored. Now, my data won't be complete, but it should be close. Some takeaways: 1. Holy crap that's a lot of players. We had 61 players who made 10+ appearances but who didn't make 50 total. That shows a lot of turnover. I don't know what a typical team has, but that struck me as a lot. It's hard to build continuity if you have players play a bunch of games but only last for a season or two. 2. It's been hard to keep people scoring consistently. We had 18 players with 10+ goals out of the 97. 14 of those made the cut at 50 appearances. Only 8 of them were forwards. 3. Ibra is a monster. He's had 85 league apps and scored 62 goals. Bacca was the second ranked scorer with only 31. 4. Going into this I expected Abate, Abbiati, and Bonventura to be locks. I was surprised how many apps Gigio and Romagnoli have made at this point. 5. I "snubbed" a few players on my list. De Sciglio had 16 more apps than Calabria and was probably a better player for us, but he's also a traitor so he doesn't make the 11. Montolivo has 120 apps, but it also never felt like he made a real impact on the game compared to Kessie or Hakan. Robinho had 120 apps and 21 goals, but he's a rapist so he's not going on my list either. 6. I started really following Milan during the 2007 CL run. It's hard to believe how long ago that was in terms of club turnover. The list of 36 is just about all new players in my brain. Secondary to that, if we compared this group to the Best 11 for 2001-2010, how big is the drop off? It's crazy. 7. My only real hesitations on my 11 are Zapata, Calabria, and Bacca, but there are no obvious replacements for them. What do you guys think? Here's the list of the 36 with 50+ apps: Player Position Total Apps Total Goals Donnarumma GK 186 Abbiati GK 133 Abate D 213 3 Romagnoli D 171 7 Zapata D 111 3 De Sciglio D 107 Calabria D 93 3 Mexes D 81 6 Bonera D 81 Rodriguez D 69 1 Musacchio D 62 1 T. Silva D 60 3 Bonaventura M 147 30 Montolivo M 120 8 Kessie M 115 19 Calhanoglu M 111 18 Poli M 90 1 Boateng M 74 10 De Jong M 74 6 Nocerino M 72 12 Muntari M 70 11 Ambrosini M 60 2 Kucka M 59 4 Biglia M 58 2 Suso F 120 21 Robinho F 108 25 Ibrahimovic F 85 62 El Shaarawy F 77 21 Pazzini F 74 21 Honda F 73 9 Bacca F 70 31 Emanuelson F 66 3 Balotelli F 63 27 Cutrone F 62 13 Castillejo F 58 6 Niang F 54 8