Monza vs Udinese

Saturday’s Serie A action gets underway at the Stadio Brianteo as top-flight debutants Monza take on an out-of-sorts Udinese.

Pressure is mounting on new head coach Giovanni Stroppa after Monza lost their first two fixtures in Serie A via an aggregate score of 6-1, including a 4-0 demolition at the hands of Napoli last time out. Such an underwhelming start to Monza’s first-ever top-flight season is not what club president Silvio Berlusconi had in mind when opening up his checkbook to land numerous senior Serie A stars, including Andrea Ranocchia, Gianluca Caprari, and Stefano Sensi. But there’s still a silver lining for ‘I Biancorossi’ as they are unbeaten in their last five league meetings with Udinese (W2, D3). Despite allowing ‘just’ 16 shots on target across three competitive outings this term, Stroppa’s men have already conceded eight goals, suggesting their backline needs further reconstruction.

On the other hand, visiting Udinese were lucky Salernitana failed to capitalise on being a man up in last weekend’s scoreless draw at Dacia Arena. Otherwise, they would have started the new season with back-to-back losses following a thumping 4-2 defeat at AC Milan on the opening weekend. Now would be a perfect time for new manager Andrea Sottil to register his first Serie A victory in charge of ‘I Friulani,’ who have racked up seven wins from their last ten top-flight meetings with newly-promoted sides (L3). However, Udinese’s topsy-turvy form across their previous 15 away league matches (W4, D5, L6) does not promise a lot, though they’ve won two of the last four via an identical 4-0 scoreline (D1, L1).