Sampdoria v Lazio

Fresh off the back of a huge and morale-boosting 3-1 win over title hopefuls Inter over the weekend, Maurizio Sarri and his Lazio side are heading to Liguria to take on one of Serie A’s worst teams so far this season as Sampdoria play hosts at the Stadio Luigi Ferraris.

Although Sarri’s side winning against Inter shouldn’t have come as a great surprise, just how impressive they were raised some eyebrows and particularly after Luis Alberto and Pedro had been brought on in the second half. On reflection, the real shock of their opening three games this season is that their trip to Torino in Matchday 2 ended without any goals being scored, having beaten Bologna 2-1 on the opening day despite having 10 men.

Against Samp, Lazio will face a side who are yet to score a single goal this season, and one who conceded four times against lowly Salernitana last time out. They’re vulnerable, and they’re facing one of the most fearsome attacks in Italian football. 

It’s likely that Luis Alberto will have forced his way into the XI with that performance against Inter, so he’ll join Sergej Milinkovic-Savic, Ciro Immobile, Mattia Zaccagni and Felipe Anderson from kick off. Each of the above will be hungry to get themselves on the scoresheet and each is more than capable.

Samp, then, will do well to get out of Marassi on Wednesday night with any sort of respectable result, and it’s hard to see this not being a thumping.

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Udinese v Fiorentina

This game in Friuli Venezia-Giulia is a little more complicated to call coming into the midweek round, with Fiorentina travelling to take on Udinese in a meeting of two sides that we’re still trying to fully work out this season.

Fiorentina should be better than their early-season results suggest, having failed to score in two of their three matches and just scraping a late and lucky win over newly-promoted Cremonese in the other. But drawing against Napoli last time out is nothing to turn your nose up at, and Vincenzo Italiano will make clear to his players that they cannot string together three goalless performances in their first four games. 

Udinese themselves are capable of shutouts though, having had a goalless draw with Salernitana in Matchday 2, but the Zebrette have scored twice in each of their other two games – last time out against Monza and previously away at Italian champions AC Milan.

So it’s hard to see this being another goalless game for La Viola, and Udinese have shown already that they’re capable of scoring this season. As a result, the smart money around this meeting in Udine should be on seeing both teams net.

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Napoli v Lecce

Napoli failing to get a goal away at Fiorentina over the weekend came as a surprise to most who follow Serie A, particularly given just how lethal they had looked in their previous two games. Welcoming fellow southerners Lecce to the Stadio Diego Armando Maradona on Wednesday, expect them to right that wrong. 

Luciano Spalletti’s Partenopei had scored nine goals in their two games before travelling to Tuscany, though many appeared to lose sight of the fact that those two games were played against a very new Hellas Verona – of which little is expected this season – and a newly-promoted Monza side who have been, in all honesty, dreadful so far this season.

But that hasn’t stopped – nor should it – Napoli fans from enjoying what they’ve seen from their own new-look side, with big names having left this summer in Kalidou Koulibaly, Lorenzo Insigne, Dries Mertens, and Fabian Ruiz is now on his way too.

The new signings have delivered. Kim Min-jae has done well at the back and even got off the mark at the other end with a goal as well, while Khvicha Kvaratskhelia has had a lot of hype around his early performances. Giacomo Raspadori has also now joined, and the latter two will likely feature alongside Matteo Politano and Victor Osimhen in attack this midweek. 

There are goals in that Napoli side, and considerably fewer threats in Lecce’s XI. Napoli should win this, and they should do so without being troubled at the back.

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Juventus v Spezia

You get the feeling with Juventus that they’ll largely swat the smaller clubs aside in Serie A this season, which is why their goalless draw against Sampdoria in Matchday 2 came as such a surprise. Having beaten Sassuolo 3-0 to open the campaign, Juventus looked like they were back. Consecutive draws since have people asking questions again, so they’ll want to answer those against Spezia in Matchday 4.

What Juventus fans will point to as an encouraging sign though is that they’ve only conceded once in their three games so far, and that came massively against the run of play as they drew 1-1 with Roma in Turin last time out. Against Samp and Sassuolo, they never looked threatened. 

That’s likely to be the case in midweek against a Spezia side who have more about them than their near-neighbours Sampdoria, but they aren’t as much of an attacking threat as Sassuolo.

The Aquilotti can be pretty tricky opponents, but Juventus should have more than enough to see them off and get back to winning ways on Wednesday. It’s hard to see Spezia scoring in this one, so Juventus should win to nil or they’ll be frustrated to another stalemate, though the former is more likely.

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Atalanta v Torino

Two of Serie A’s unknown quantities ahead of the season starting, but both Atalanta and Torino can be pleased with their respective starts to the 2022/23 campaign. That, as a result, makes it hard for a winner to be called ahead of their meeting at the Gewiss Stadium on Thursday. 

There are six teams bunched at the top on seven points from the three games played so far this season, and Atalanta and Torino are two of those, which both would have taken before a ball was kicked as many appeared to have written each off. 

Although Atalanta are unbeaten in their last five in Serie A against Toro, the Granata have still been something of a bogey side for them when they’ve come to Bergamo. La Dea haven’t won at home against Thursday’s visitors since April 2018, with Torino winning one and drawing three since then. 

Gian Piero Gasperini will be concerned by that statistic, but also by his side’s generally poor home record. They were in the bottom half of the table for home form last season, and they haven’t won any of their last seven in front of their own fans in Bergamo. They’ve not gone eight without a win at home since 2009.

Their draw against AC Milan in their last home outing though will offer some encouragement and suggest that they’re starting to rediscover their ways. 

Neither team winning would come as a shock in this one, but both teams should be finding the net as they are more than capable of troubling the other while also being their own worst enemies.

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