Roma will hope to bounce back from their midweek continental misery when they travel to the Stadio Sant’Elia to take on last year’s Serie B champions Cagliari.
I Rossoblu will be searching for their first points of the season, while Luciano Spalletti’s men will hope they can reinforce last week’s 4-0 league victory over Udinese.
Key Battle – Marco Borriello vs Edin Džeko
The signing of veteran free-agent Marco Borriello was a coup for the newly-promoted Cagliari – he bagged four goals in his side’s Coppa Italia win over SPAL, while also being their solo scorer last week at Genoa. He has caused the Romans some grief in the past and will be hoping he can find the net once more against his former club.
On the other side of the pitch, Roma’s Edin Džeko will be hoping to add to his wonderful start in the opening round. The Bosnian international captain earned his team a penalty and converted from the spot in their rout of Udinese.
Team News
Cagliari will likely be unchanged from their match against Genoa last weekend.
Cagliari expected lineup (3-5-2): Storari; Ceppitelli, Bruno Alves, Capuano; Isla, Padoin, Di Gennaro, Ionita, Murru; Borriello, Sau
Alessandro Florenzi will rejoin the Giallorossi team after a spell on the sidelines from injury, but Bruno Peres has done enough to keep his spot at right-back.
AS Roma expected lineup (4-3-3): Alisson; Bruno Peres, Manolas, Vermaelen, Juan Jesus; Nainggolan, Strootman, Paredes; Salah, Džeko, El Shaarawy
Head-to-head
The teams have met on 34 occasions previously, with I Giallorossi winning 16 compared to nine for the Sardinians have won nine, the same number have also ended in draws.
Previous Meeting
The two sides last faced off in February 2015 at the Stadio Sant’Elia, where Roma were 2-1 victors thanks to strikes from Adem Ljajic and Leandro Paredes.
Prediction
Roma’s European woes continued on Wednesday morning as they were bundled out of the Champions League qualifying stages by FC Porto. They will be travelling to Sardinia to prove a point – that the Serie A and gaining automatic qualification to next year’s competition is now their main focus.
The attacking trident of the visitors should be enough to put Cagliari away, while their defence will be tough to break down by the competition minnows.
Cagliari 1 AS Roma 3
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