SPAL vs Roma 23/07/20

23 July 2020

In-form Roma travel to the Stadio Paolo Mazza to meet basement boys SPAL hoping to secure back-to-back Serie A triumphs for the first time in 2020.

Dead-last SPAL have lost all seven of their eight Serie A games post restart (D1), drawing a blank in all but two of those defeats. Indeed, a genuine lack of firepower up front sees the hosts as the only side in Italy’s top-flight yet to smash a 30-goal barrier. ‘Gli Spallini’ lament a league-low average of 0.7 goals scored per Serie A fixture this season, having failed to find the net in 44.12% of their league matches thus far (15/34). Particularly ponderous in the attack after the break, Luigi Di Biagio’s men have netted just four second-half goals at home for the entire league campaign, failing to do such thing in seven of eight Serie A home outings this calendar year.

As for the visitors, they take the field after avoiding defeat in four league fixtures (W3, D1), all of which saw them score two goals or more. That’s a notable upgrade to the fact they had scored just once in three Serie A games prior (L3). Curiously, though, a draw has not been an option for Roma on the road since the calendar year flipped (W3, L4), with each of those results (win/loss) seeing the winner on the day score over 1.5 goals. However, the ‘Giallorossi’ have been relentless when taking on the current bottom-five sides away from home (W4), with three of those victories yielding a full-time margin of at least two goals.