Marcus Thuram is currently the joint-leading scorer in Serie A this season, his seven goals have come from just 20 shots and when you account for 60% of those efforts also being on target, it is fair to say that the French forward is rather efficient when it comes to testing the opposition goalkeeper.

In addition to this, Thuram’s goals have come from an expected value of just 2.6 and with such a positive swing, the 27-year-old is currently one of the most feared strikers in Europe. Feared enough to have at least one shot on target on Sunday night.

We will also take Lautaro Martinez to fire at least one effort on goal. Martinez’s current tally of total shots stands at 17 with only six of them actually being on target. While Thuram is outperforming his xG by a considerable margin, the Argentine’s own value of 1.9 is only being outperformed by 0.1.

However, his inability to be ruthless at the start of the season is not going to put us off when looking at his average shots per game, at 2.84 shots per game at present, asking for four at the Stadio Olimpico is not outside the realms of possibility.

The Swiss shot-stopper has been ever-present this season and in the seven games that he has appeared in during the start of Inter’s Serie A campaign, Sommer has conceded nine goals. From 30 shots on target that have come his way, the 35-year-old has saved 20.

This equates to a save rate of 73.3% this season. Perhaps more importantly, those 20 saves equate to 2.85 saves per league game for 2024/25.

With the ability of Sommer, added to Roma’s issues in the final third, it feels as if Sunday’s game between the two teams will not lead to an abundance of goals.

Roma have only scored an average of 1.14 goals this season and Inter have conceded just 1.29 by comparison, the numbers suggest three in total should serve as the upper limit.

To widen that point, Roma’s total goals (for and against) is 1.86 and Inter’s is 3.57. When you add the two metrics together and then divide, it equates to 2.72 – which makes under 3.5 total goals look a potentially smart pick here.

When looking at Roma’s average count for corners both for and against, this season’s figure sits at 8.0 and when applied next to Inter’s own value of 9.86, neither team has surpassed the 10 in total. Keep this up on Sunday and the opening leg can be ticked off.

Roma’s last three matches have all seen under 11 total corners, as have 6 of Inter’s last 7 outings in all competitions.

Roma’s total card count currently sits at 3.29 per match ahead of this clash, with Inter’s at 2.86. Neither of these come close to the line we are taking here.

In addition, Nor Roma or Inter have seen more that 5 total cards in any of their last three consecutive matches.

Sunday’s hosts have earned the same number of average cards as the visitors this term — 1.29 to be exact. Roma accumulated 2 yellows to Inter’s 0 the last time these two met, they’ve also collected more cautions than Inter in all of the last three head-to-head matches.

It feels as if Roma will certainly have a point to prove after a less than convincing start to the season, which could see their aggressive approach lead to a few cautions here.

Simone Inzaghi’s men are averaging 5.14 shots on target since the start of the 2024/25 season and even though Inter find themselves away from home this weekend, they will be confident that they can do some damage to Roma’s defence.

Over the last three matches, Inter have recorded a shot on target count of 8, 7 and 7, which adds further encouragement here. In Roma’s last home match, they conceded 7 shots on target to Serie A strugglers Venezia.