Tiemoue Bakayoko is not the first nor the last poor soul to fall foul of Gennaro Gattuso’s legendary temper.
But, while the Chelsea flop’s 2018/19 loan spell at AC Milan ended in acrimony and a high-profile falling out with the fire-breathing Nerazzuri boss, it is easy to forget that, before things went rather Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor, Bakayoko and Gattuso looked like a marriage made in heaven.
The 2006 World Cup winner succeeded where Antonio Conte had failed by getting the very best out of his 6ft 2ins powerhouse, after all.
Bakayoko arrived at Milan having hit rock bottom during that dismal season at Chelsea but, just a few short months later, he was once again displaying the kind of outstanding displays that helped fire Monaco to Ligue 1 glory.
“I think he’s an atypical deep-lying midfielder in modern football’, Gattuso told Rai Sport (translated by The Mail) after Bakayoko shone during Milan’s 2-0 victory over Napoli.
“He can turn the play from defensive to attacking, he takes men on and always gets past them. He has learned so much about transitions as, at the start, he got it wrong most of the time.”
Unfortunately, it didn’t take long for things to explode. Bakayoko paid the price for a rather fiery reaction to being subbed off in the final few games of the Serie A campaign and that was never going to go down well with Gattuso; an old-school disciplinarian who operates with an iron fist, steel shins and brass knuckles.
With Le10 Sport claiming that West Ham United are the latest club wiling to take a punt on Stamford Bridge’s £40 million misfit, it feels like the perfect time to remember all that is good about Bakayoko.
This is a man who dominated French and European football alongside Kylian Mbappe and Bernardo Silva at Monaco, ending PSG’s stranglehold on the Ligue 1 title albeit briefly. This is a man who, for a while at least, looked like Milan’s best midfielder in years.
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