MILAN (AP) — A cup specialist will take on a serial runner-up when AC Milan plays Bologna in the Italian Cup final on Wednesday.
And both teams will be looking to get their hands on the trophy for the first time in decades.
Bologna hasn’t won the Italian Cup since 1974, which was its last major trophy.
Milan has won plenty of trophies since then, but last lifted the Italian Cup 22 years ago — losing two finals in the intervening years.
This time, however, the Rossoneri are led by a cup specialist in coach Sérgio Conceição.
Indeed, Conceição has already steered Milan to a trophy this season — winning the Italian Super Cup in January just a week after being appointed as coach.
That was the 50-year-old’s 12th trophy as coach, with nine coming in cup competitions.
Conceição also lifted seven cup trophies as a player, with Porto and Lazio.
However, even if Milan ends the season with two trophies in Conceição’s five months in charge, it might not be enough to save the Portuguese coach’s job.
Milan is eighth in Serie A with two rounds remaining and only has a slim chance of qualifying for the Champions League — or any European competition.
Winning the Italian Cup would earn Milan a spot in the Europa League and go some way toward salvaging a season where the Rossoneri were never competitive in Serie A or Europe, having been dumped out of the Champions League by Feyenoord in the knockout playoff round.
“It’s not the moment to talk about my future,” Conceição said. “Now we’re only thinking about this final, against a difficult team to face.
“I have my character and my personality, I’ve changed things and you need time but at Milan you don’t have time. … At Milan, what counts is winning trophies and Wednesday we have a great chance.”
In contrast to Conceição, Bologna coach Vincenzo Italiano has not fared well in finals.
Italiano never won a cup in his playing days and, as Fiorentina coach, he lost back-to-back Europa Conference League finals — in 2023 and 2024 — and finished runner-up in the 2023 Italian Cup.
Second meeting in a week
The cup final in Rome will be the teams’ second meeting in less than a week.
Two goals from Santiago Giménez, either side of a Christian Pulisic strike, saw Milan rally to beat Bologna 3-1 and seriously dent its opponent’s chances of qualifying for the Champions League again.
“We were ahead and we thought we could control it, Milan didn’t give the impression of wanting to attack,” Bologna scorer Riccardo Orsolini said in an interview with Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera.
“We gave them the spark that rekindled them and we got sliced through like butter. If we play like that in Rome we’ll get slapped. We’ve understood what we shouldn’t do.”
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