10-man Roma secure last four against Milan

Roma secured the Europa League semi-final ticket after beating Milan 2-1, winning 3-1 on aggregate.

Having won the first leg 1-0 in Milan last week via Gianluca Mancini header, Roma wet two goals up at the Stadio Olimpico through Gianluca Mancini and Paulo Dybala before being down to 10 men for an hour.

The Giallorossi went in front to double their lead on aggregate in the opening minutes. Paulo Dybala’s trademark curler bounce off the far post and Mancini was quickest to react on the rebound. He celebrated with the shirt worn during the warm-up, dedicating the goal to to Mattia Giani, who died on the pitch during a semi-pro game on Sunday and was a relative.

Milan hit the crossbar through Ruben Loftus-Cheek’s shot after the former Chelsea midfielder knocked the ball into the ground.

Roma then doubled their lead, making it 3-0 on aggregate. Romelu Lukaku battled to keep the ball and shake off defenders, and his cross was cleared by Matteo Gabbia, which went in the direction of Dybala, who curled it in with his left foot into the far bottom corner.

 After Lukaku was forced to limp off with a knee injury after 29 minutes, Roma suffered a further setback a moment later when the referee opted for a straight red card as Zeki Celik dived into the sliding tackle on Rafael Leao, reducing Roma to 10 men.

In an attempt to comeback into the tie, despite having a man advantage, Milan couldn’tmake a headway as they pour forward.

After Loftus-Cheek’s diving header was charged down by Mancini’s back in the six-yard box, Milan appealed for a penalty after Chris Smalling handled the ball from a corner, but VAR showed Olivier Giroud handled first.

After ringing some changes at half time, Milan continued their search for goals but couldn’t find them.

Leonardo Spinazzola sprung the offside trap and tested Mike Maignan, while Tammy Abraham fired over after an initial effort was charged down.

Lorenzo Pellegrini was there again to make a decisive sliding block to stop Chukwueze tapping in the Leao pull-back. 

After Svilar fingertipped a Reijnders scorcher over the bar from the edge of the area and on the resulting corner, Matteo Gabbia reduced the deficit for the visitors with a strong header from Rafael Leao’s cross.

Milan were initially reduced to ten men when as Marciniak showed the red card to Theo Hernandez for clipping El Shaarawy’s heels. He then changed it to a yellow following a brief VAR review.

Written by Oladipupo Mojeed