Serie A side AS Roma will be looking to gain a bit of an advantage over Portuguese side FC Porto when the two sides clash in the first leg of their UEFA Champions League last-sixteen clash at the Olympic Stadium in Rome on Tuesday. The two teams have last met in this competition at the play-off stage in 2016 and FC Porto prevailed with a 3-0 away victory after a 1-1 draw at home. Before that they had only met all the way back in 1981 in the Cup Winners' Cup and FC Porto won that tie as well after a 2-0 home victory and a goalless draw in Italy. However, FC Porto have won just 8 of their 30 matches against Italian teams in European competitions.
AS Roma are not having the best of season, they are in real danger of finishing outside the top four in Serie A and they suffered a humiliating exit in Coppa Italia after losing 7-1 at Fiorentina. The only thing that has been going more or less well for Roma this season was the Champions League, even though they can count themselves lucky for finishing second in their group after losing three of their six matches. Last week they managed to end a streak of three games without a win with a 3-0 triumph at Chievo, but things will be a lot more difficult against Porto. Diego Perotti, Juan Jesus, Robin Olsen and Patrik Schick are injured and won't play in this match.
FC Porto had a great Champions League campaign so far, they finished at the top of their group after winning five of their six matches and they scored an impressive fifteen goals. It is true that they had fairly tame opposition in their group as they faced Schalke, Galatasaray and Lokomotiv Moscow, but finishing the group stage undefeated is still a remarkable achievement. Last week they recorded a 1-1 draw against Moreirense in the Portuguese league, and that result cut their advantage at the top of the table to just one point over Benfica. Jesus Manuel Corona is suspended for this match, while Vincent Aboubakar and Moussa Marega are injured.
Probable line-ups:
Roma: Mirante - Florenzi, Manolas, Fazio, Kolarov - Nzonzi, De Rossi - Kluivert, Zaniolo, El Shaarawy - Dzeko
Porto: Casillas - Militao, Felipe, Pepe, Telles - Otavio, Pereira, Herrera, Brahimi - Fernando, Soares
My prediction: 1-1 draw, Porto are the favourites for this tie and they should be able to grab a decent result in the first leg.
Here are the odds for the match at Bet365:
Roma win - 2.10
Draw - 3.50
Porto win - 3.75
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Comments (1)
sharpe
02/26/19, 11:02:55 AM
It's an interesting tie that one. Two kind of equal teams have met at the Olimpico, Porto had more of the ball in that first leg but Roma probably should regret...
It's an interesting tie that one. Two kind of equal teams have met at the Olimpico, Porto had more of the ball in that first leg but Roma probably should regret they didn't kept a clean sheet after leading 2-0 which should of make them a huge favorites to progress to the last 8 stage. But when we have in mind what both teams showed it's probably a fair result and the second leg promising to be really tied as this one.
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