Milan came into this game brimming with confidence after a 3-1 away win in Verona. 14 points from their first seven games indicates a strong start to the season with only one loss this season against Juventus. The major call looking at the line-up was the inclusion of Ménez who replaced Torres. Diego López was once again on the bench as Inzaghi eases him to the starting XI after overcoming a hamstring injury. Fiorentina on the other hand came into this game wanting retribution. After a disappointing 2-0 loss to fellow European chasers Lazio and a season which has only accumulated 10 points from their first seven games which shows a sense of frustration for the Viola.
The first 15 minutes were controlled by Milan who were dictating the pace of the game. Fiorentina couldn't quite get going for large spells of the first half. The first major chance of the game resulted in a goal. 26 minutes gone and it was Ménez's looping corner-kick which was met by Zapata at the back post who headed it back to Nigel de Jong who headed it to the bottom left hand side of Neto's goal.
The deadlock had finally been broken at the Stadio Giuseppe Meazza. 33 minutes had been played and Fiorentina got their first real chance of the match as Jasmin Kurtić failed to capitalize from a double defensive error from first Cristián Zapata and then Nigel de Jong. Kurtić's shot went narrowly past Abbiati's post. The Italian shot stopper didn't really look troubled.
51 minutes had struck at the San Siro for the next meaningful attack. This time it was Jérémy Ménez who had the Fiorentina defence on the back foot. His snapshot effort was calmly collected by Neto in the end, the Frenchman would've felt he really should have done better. Meanwhile Fiorentina were growing into the game in the second half. The first of two good opportunities saw Alberto Aquilani's thunderbolt well held by Abbiati after Stephan El Shaarawy's initial mistake. The second came from Matías Fernández blasting his effort way over the bar.
The turning point of the game came with the substitution of Josip Iličić. This proved to be decisive as the Slovenian international ran forward from a counter-attack and saw his left-footed effort go past Abbiati into the far bottom corner from the outside of the box. From then on a Fiorentina win seemed inevitable, they were the team on the ascendancy. However things didn't really materialize that way as efforts from Babacar and substitute Juan Manuel Vargas were blocked by the Brazilian Alex.
So in the end the points were shared between the two sides. A 1-1 draw with goals coming from Nigel de Jong for Milan and Josip Iličić for the visitors. A great and hard fought point by the team from Tuscany. A disappointed and frustrating evening for the hosts, who could of closed the gap between themselves and Roma within two points with a victory tonight. They would hope to put that right in Sardinia when they play Cagliari on Wednesday night.
Meanwhile the away side would feel a tad unfortunate that they didn't win the game after their equalizer. Their disappointing season has been bettered however by a good solid point at the San Siro. Their next game is at home in Florence where they entertain a Udinese side who are in great form and vying for a European place also.