Fiorentina vs Benfica 25/07/19

25 July 2019

Fiorentina and Benfica go head-to-head at Red Bull Arena as part of their participation in the 2019 International Champions Cup.

It will be Fiorentina’s third game in the competition, with the Viola beating the Mexican outfit Chivas Guadalajara 2-1 before suffering a 3-0 loss to Arsenal. Failure against the Premier League giants has brought Fiorentina’s three-game winning run to a halt, but it has been their fourth consecutive game that has produced over 2.5 goals. But, Vincenzo Montella is still unable to fix his team’s problems in the final third that have seen the Tuscan-based side fail to find the net in six of their last nine outings. Meanwhile, his players have struggled to keep a clean sheet seven times across the same period, allowing over 1.5 goals per match once though.

On the other hand, the reigning Primeira Liga holders have started their ICC campaign off on the right foot, pulling off a comfortable 3-0 win over Chivas. It was Benfica’s second victory in three friendly fixtures this summer (W2, L1), with both of those successes seeing them beat their rivals to nil and score three or more goals. Outstandingly, nine of Benfica’s last ten games have produced over 2.5 goals, with the Eagles scoring over 2.5 match goals eight times along the way. A potential worry for Bruno Lage could be that his players have failed to keep a blank slate on seven occasions in the same span, conceding two or more goals per match four times.