AS Roma vs Napoli prediction: ITALY: Serie A betting tips on match 2023-12-22 19:45.
There’s a managerial game of cat-and-mouse brewing at Roma, where José Mourinho says he’s happy to stay, but those in charge of the club are in no hurry to make a decision. If, as reports suggest, they expect the Portuguese coach to achieve a top-four finish, then there’s work to do as they currently sit in eighth place following Sunday’s 2-0 Serie A (SA) defeat to Bologna.
In Mourinho’s defence, the Giallorossi are only a handful of points behind the top four as the battle behind leaders Inter Milan and Juventus hots up. Their home form has been a huge factor in keeping them in contention as they’re unbeaten in SA matches here since AC Milan beat them at the start of September (W5, D1) and they haven’t conceded more than once in any of those six fixtures.
Like Milan last term, Napoli’s title defence has not lived up to expectations and they’re already on their second manager of the season in Walter Mazzarri. His appointment hasn’t yet had the desired effect (W3, L4 in all competitions) and he publicly apologised after they were dumped out of the cup by Frosinone on Tuesday via a humiliating 4-0 home defeat.
Nevertheless, they’re two points better off than Roma and seemingly on course for a return to Europe next term, but now the Partenopei will want to prove that losing at Juventus earlier this month was just a one-off as it ended an eight-match unbeaten streak in league away games (W5, D3). Encouragingly, they’ve lost just one of the last seven away H2Hs (W5, D1), keeping clean sheets in the last three of those (W2, D1).
Players to watch: Stephan El Shaarawy has scored in the 90th minute of two of Roma’s last four home league matches, while Victor Osimhen, who netted the only goal in this fixture last term, also opened the scoring in Napoli’s last league game (W 2-1 v Cagliari).
Hot stat: The home side on the day kept a first-half clean sheet in seven of the last eight H2Hs (Napoli: W5, D2, L1).