Football – Italy – Serie A
Saturday 14th February 2015 – Kickoff: 1945hrs
Ninth placed Palermo play host to third placed Napoli who are sitting comfortably in a Champions League qualifiers spot, but they have their sights set on an automatic CL place being just four points adrift of Roma.
Looking at Palermo first, and the hosts have hit a bit of an erratic streak of form recently with just one win from their last five, which was a 2-1 home win against lowly Hellas Verona a couple of weeks ago. Aside from that though, they’ve been held to draws by Roma and Sampdoria, while suffering defeats to Fiorentina and Inter Milan (both away from home).
Although they’ve lost at home just once so far this season, Palermo’s successes have almost been exclusively against the bottom half teams as they’ve failed to beat a top half team at home so far in four attempts. Their overall record though stands at a solid 6-4-1 18/12, and they’ve won four of their last five on home soil.
Napoli have hit a rich vein of form at just about the right time as they’ve chalked up four straight wins in Serie A with victories over Lazio, Genoa, Chievo Verona and Udinese. This has lifted them up into a clear third place behind leaders Juventus and second placed Roma, but they’ll want to keep the pressure on Roma, particularly as they host bottom club Parma this Sunday.
Napoli’s away record stands at 6-3-2 15/10 and they’ve won their last three on the trot. They’ll head into this evening’s game in buoyant mood having disposed of Udinese so effectively last week, and with forwards Higuain and Jose Callejon amongst the goals recently, they could prove a handful at Palermo tonight.
Palermo’s form has dipped in recent weeks, so I reckon Napoli will take full advantage and will give the quarter ball in the visitors’ favour in this one which could end up a 2-1 win for Napoli.
Pick: Napoli AH-0.25 @ 1.78 Bet Victor
