Fiorentina vs Napoli: Preview and Prediction
Fiorentina will be looking to maintain their fine start to the season when they welcome in-form Napoli in Serie A on Monday. The visitors have also begun on a blistering note and will be confident of seeing off their hosts.
Fiorentina has made an unbeaten start to the season with a win and a draw from their opening two Serie A matches. Their previous fixture was a 0-0 draw at Empoli as they failed to make their dominance and superior possession count.
La Viola is also playing in the Europa Conference League and are coming off a 0-0 draw at Twente on Thursday. Although they still progressed to the group stage of the competition, the lack of goals in the last two matches will be worrying for manager Vincenzo Italiano.
The good news for Fiorentina is that the Stadio Artemio Franchi remains a fortress, and they claimed a 3-2 victory over Cremonense in their opening fixture. They have now won six of their last seven home matches in Serie A.
Napoli appears to be picking up where they left off last season and have made a blistering start to the season. They have won their opening two Serie A matches and are looking confident at the moment.
The impressive thing about Napoli’s start to the season is the manner of their results as Luciano Spalletti’s summer overhaul appears to be working. They began with a 5-2 victory at Verona before running out 4-0 winners over Monza last time out.
One of the hallmarks of Napoli’s campaign last season was a solid record on their travels which they appear to be maintaining this term going by the result at Verona. They travel to Fiorentina with just one defeat in their last 10 Serie A matches on the road, claiming eight wins in that run.
What have they done so far?
The efforts of la Viola were enough only for a boring 0-0 draw when performing as a visitor against Twente in a UEFA Europa Conference League match played on August 25th. They have not suffered a loss for five games in a row, with 3 wins and 2 draws in total. The home factor has proven its significance in Fiorentina’s last 10 encounters.
The squad playing at home triumphed 7 times and have not lost in 9 out of 10. The outfit finished in a draw in only 2 of the preceding 10 meetings. Out of the last five Fiorentina clashes, two produced over 2.5 goals and two witnessed goals at both ends. Within this time frame, they were able to keep three clean sheets, and the team failed to score a goal in two. Judging by the numbers, the team’s preceding 5 outings saw an average of 2.00 goals.
In their most recent match, Napoli played against Monza on Monday, with the final score being a colossal 4-0 home win. At the moment, the team is enjoying a streak of six successive victories. Playing at home turned out to be of little help across the ten previous Napoli games as the hosting party recorded 4 wins and the travelling sides registered 5 triumphs. Only one of the club’s last 10 encounters resulted in a draw.
All but one of the squad’s five last meetings had over 2.5 goals and one witnessed goals at both ends of the field. Napoli kept four clean sheets and they scored one or more goals in all of those clashes. Their last five outings finished with 3.6 goals on average.
Team News
Vicenzo Italiano is expected to make several changes on Monday night
While Vincenzo Italiano is expected to make several changes to his side following Fiorentina’s midweek trip to the Netherlands, Riccardo Sottil will hope to retain his place in the front three. Given a growing squad, Italiano can also select from Nicolas Gonzalez, Jonathan Ikone, Christian Kouame and Riccardo Saponara to support Luka Jovic – the latter should replace Arthur Cabral as the hosts’ central striker.
Despite his dismissal in Europe, Igor could still feature in the back four, while only midfield pair Gaetano Castrovilli and Szymon Zurkowski are confirmed absentees.
Meanwhile, Napoli is two options down in their engine room, too, as Diego Demme recently suffered a broken foot and Fabian Ruiz continues to train separately as he seeks to leave the club.
Like their hosts’ the Azzurri now have an abundance of attacking options from which to choose, but Khvicha Kvaratskhelia is almost certain to start after making a significant impact so far. With a goal on Monday, the winger would become only the first Napoli player to score in his first three top-flight matches for the club since Jose Callejon.
Likely to start among the substitutes, Giovanni Simeone previously played 74 times and scored 20 goals for Fiorentina in Serie A; fellow new boys Tanguy Ndombele and Giacomo Raspadori are also poised to make their debuts from the bench.
Head to Head Record
Fiorentina won their last encounter against Napoli 3-2
Napoli has a good record against Fiorentina and has won 19 out of the 37 matches played between the two teams. Fiorentina has managed nine victories against Napoli and will need to cut the deficit in this fixture.
The previous meeting between the two teams took place in April this year and ended in a 3-2 victory for Fiorentina. Napoli was poor on the day and have a point to prove this weekend.
Predicted Starting XIs
Fiorentina (4-3-3): Pierluigi Gollini; Cristiano Biraghi, Lucas Martinez Quarta, Nikola Milenkovic, Dodo; Rolando Mandragora, Sofyan Amrabat, Alfred Duncan; Riccaro Sottil, Nicolas Gonzalez, Luka Jovic
Napoli Predicted XI (4-3-3): Alex Meret; Giovanni Di Lorenzo, Amir Rrahmani, Kim Min-Jae, Mario Rui; Andre-Frank Zambo Anguissa, Stanislav Lobotka, Piotr Zielinski; Hirving Lozano, Victor Osimhen, Khvicha Kvaratskhelia
Prediction
Napoli has a new-look squad this season and has plenty of work to do to keep up with the league’s Milanese giants. With Lorenzo Insigne and Dries Mertens leaving gaping holes behind them, the likes of Hirving Lozano and Victor Osimhen will need to shoulder the goalscoring burden in the coming months.
Fiorentina can pack a punch on their day and has troubled the Neapolitans on several occasions in the past. Napoli is the better team on paper, however, and hold a slight upper hand going into this game.
We expect the visitors to win the game against the Florence-based side, we feel that the visitors will win 2-1.
