Third-placed Atalanta are looking to extend their unbeaten run in Serie A to eight games, but they will need a massive performance if they want to pull that off as they are visiting fourth-placed Napoli at San Paolo Stadium on Wednesday evening. Last season Atalanta won 2-1 in Naples after having sufferred an idendical defeat in the reverse fixture. Atalanta have won three of the last six direct matches, all of them away from home, while the other three were won by Napoli, two of them in Bergamo.
Napoli are unbeaten in the last six matches in all competitions, but they have won just one of their last three Serie A matches. Last week they managed to secure a great 3-2 victory at Salzburg in the UEFA Champions League, but at the weekend they were held to a 1-1 draw at Spal, despite having opened the scoring after just nine minutes through Arkadiusz Milik. Head coach Carlo Ancelotti is having to deal with an injury crisis in defence, with full-backs Mario Rui, Nikola Maksimovic, Elseid Hysaj and Kevin Malcuit out of contention, along with central defender Kostas Manolas.
Atalanta seem to be having another dream campaign, after having qualified for the UEFA Champions League for the first time in their history at the end of last season. It is true that they have lost three out of three so far in the UEFA Champions League group stage, but in Serie A they are unbeaten in the last seven matches and are sitting proudly in third place, just three points behind leaders Juventus. Last weekend they recorded a massive home win, 7-1 over Udinese, taking their tally to 21 goals scored in the last six league matches. Duvan Zapata is the only injury concern for the visitors.
Probable line-ups:
Napoli: Meret - Lorenzo, Koulibaly, Luperto, Ghoulam - Callejon, Allan, Ruiz, Zielinski - Insigne, Milik
Atalanta: Gollini - Toloi, Kjaer, Djimsiti - Hateboer, De Roon, Pasalic, Gosens - Malinovskiy - Muriel, Ilicic
My prediction:
Atalanta are in great form, and considering their recent results in Naples I think they will record a 3-2 victory in this match.
Here are the odds for the match at NetBet:
Napoli win - 2.00
Draw - 3.70
Atalanta win - 3.40
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