Napoli coach, Gennaro Gattuso, has returned to the sideline, and his first game will be against Parma.
Coincidentally, the teams are tied on the 7th spot on the Italian Serie A log. This is really an important head-to-head with Parma.
Napoli, who will be at home for the Saturday clash, begins the weekend seven points adrift of the top four. They cannot, therefore, afford to drop further behind the pack being a usual Champions League team for the past four seasons.
Despite qualifying for the knockout stage of the prestigious European club competition, Napoli sacked their former coach Carlo Ancelotti. This means qualifying for the Mundial is a top burner for them.
They are now looking unto Gattuso with the expectation that the former Italian midfielder will offer much more than his former coach.
Gattuso has immediately confirmed he would shift back to the 4-3-3 formation. Information from sources said that Lorenzo Insigne and Dries Mertens could find themselves down the pecking order in favour of Chucky Lozano and Piotr Zielinski. Arkadiusz Milik, who scored a hat-trick during the midweek, is tipped to retain his spot ahead of Fernando Llorente.
With three losses in their last ten games, the visitors could give Napoli a run for their money. Although, they still have a faint hope of qualifying for the 2021 edition of the Europa League places. With their discipline being evident in most of their games, they could hit Napoli on the counter and get the result in Naples.
Another intimidating stats Parma is bringing to Sao Paolo Stadium on Saturday is that they are undefeated in their last four away fixtures. However, they have been poor away from home in 2019, having won just three of their 17 away matches, the last was a 1-0 victory at Sampdoria, which was also their first clean sheet away from home this season.
Napoli needs to watch out for Parma’s attacking threats in the likes of Gervinho and Dejan Kulusevski, who will flank Andreas Cornelius.
Unavailable for Parma in the game are Juraj Kucka, Roberto Inglese, Yann Karamoh, and Alberto Grassi, who are on the treatment table.
With the Partenopei failing to win a single game in a league game since October and have kept just one clean sheet since then, Parma will hope to add to their misery.
But what does Gatusso has up his sleeves? We will see on Saturday.
Napoli are set at 1.33 to win Parma, while Parma are available at 9/63 to get a massive win over Napoli
Written by Oladipupo Mojeed
