Napoli hosts Barcelona in the first leg of the Champions League 1/8 finals. The match will be played on Tuesday, February 25th at Stadio San Paolo (Naples)
Napoli is far from holding the best season - the Neapolitans are in the sixth position in the Serie A standings and lag 24 points behind the leader, which is quite unusual since Napoli was Juventus’s main rival in recent seasons. But I would like to note the fact that the team from Naples has seriously added up recently – it gained seven victories in the last nine matches, and today's hosts didn’t score in only one of those games. Of course, the first match with Barcelona will be an indicator of the true progress of the Neapolitans under Gattuso. The Italians should score a goal since the defense of Barcelona is not a bulwark of reliability, and Napoli, frankly, has someone to score. But keeping a clean sheet will be extremely difficult, as the defense of the hosts often fails, especially with matches against powerful opponents. I think that the fans will see a scoring game.
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Barcelona is at the stage of restructuring, and to deny it is quite difficult. Finally, Valverde was fired, Quique Setien replaced him, and his tiki-taka, which the ardent fans of the Catalan squad had been waiting for, brings more and more results with each match. In the last match, the Spanish grandee smashed Eibar with a score of 5-0, and Lionel Messi scored four goals. I cannot but note the fact that Braithwaite made his debut, and although he didn’t score, he distracted the attention of Eibar’s defenders perfectly - Messi received much more freedom. Nobody canceled the importance of an away goal, so Barcelona will surely not play too passively. But I cannot but note the fact that the defense of the Catalans does not shine with particular reliability - in the last 12 matches, they managed to keep a clean sheet only three times.
I cannot but note the fact that Barcelona and Napoli never met in the framework of official tournaments in the 21st century, which is rather strange when you consider that both of them are regular participants in Euro cups. The Neapolitans have recently managed to add seriously, and this applies to the game in attack, but Barcelona is unlikely to be left without goals - I bet that both teams will be able to score!
Prediction for the match: Both teams to score - yes
