After three consecutive 2-1 defeats, Fiorentina will be keen to return to winning ways on Wednesday evening when they face 19th placed Hellas Verona at the Bentegodi.
The Viola know that anything less than victory against Verona will likely see them fall below Inter and Lazio into sixth place, and dampen any suggestions that they are realistic challengers for the Scudetto. Whilst the defeats to Roma and Napoli can be tolerated given the respective strengths of their opponents’ squads, and particularly given the spirited displays in both those matches, the performance against Lech Poznan in the Europa League left a lot to be desired.
Their opponents have suffered a poor start to the season, and will be looking for their first win in what will be their tenth league game. It has been a difficult start to the season for the Gialloblu, as they have struggled defensively, conceding 15 goals in 9 games however, their home record has seen them lose only one of their four home fixtures to date. Despite Verona have only scored 8 goals this season, Fiorentina will be wary of the threat posed by former Viola man, Giampaolo Pazzini, whilst they will be thankful that Viola legend, and last season’s joint Capocannonieri, Luca Toni, remains injured and will miss the game.
This fixture has always provided goals, with 22 having been scored in the last 5 matches between these teams. Viola Coach, Paulo Sousa, will be hoping for a repeat of recent fixtures at the Bentegodi, which has seen Fiorentina win the last three, scoring 9 goals in the process.
So far this season, Sousa has rotated his squad on a game by game basis to cope with the plethora of domestic and European games which the Viola face; however, given the recent run of results, it is likely that he will stick with the majority of the team that narrowly lost against Roma at the weekend. The only potential changes that might be seen are Manuel Pasqual replacing Facundo Roncaglia, who was poor against Roma, and Marcos Alonso returning from injury in place of Federico Bernardeschi. To strengthen their attacking threat, Sousa might also look to start one of Khouma Babacar or Giuseppe Rossi in place of Josep Ilicic, with Babacar the favourite to do so after scoring 3 goals in 5 league appearances this season.
Despite three consecutive defeats, Paulo Sousa cut a relaxed figure in his pre-match press conference on Tuesday stating:
“Three defeats in a week? Definitely we deserved more than we got. I am not worried because there is a lot of collective quality, we want to win through continuity of performance.”
“Our fans were great [after the defeat against Roma] and we have to pay them back with determination and will to win.”
Hellas Verona likely starting line-up (3-5-2): Rafael; Moras, Helander, Marquez; Pisano, Greco, Hallfreosson, Sala, Souprayen; Taleb, Pazzini
Fiorentina likely starting line-up (3-5-2): Tatarasanu; Pasqual, Rodriguez, Astori; Blaszczykowski, Badelj, Vecino, Valero, Alonso; Babacar, Kalinic
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