Bologna take on the visitors AS Roma in the first leg of UEFA Europa League round of 1/8-finals. The match will be played on Thursday, March 12th at Stadio Renato Dall'Ara (Bologna).
Bologna are generally not used to being perceived as a grand club. It was in the season before last, under Thiago Motta, that they produced a breakthrough, managing to finish 5th in Serie A. Recently the team have alternated encouraging performances with disappointing setbacks, which has made their overall campaign look inconsistent. At the same time, Bologna often manage to stay competitive in tight matches, which shows that the team still has enough quality to challenge respectable opponents. That success even sent them to the Champions League, but they debuted there unsuccessfully, failing to reach the playoffs and also slipping back to the middle of the Serie A table. Still, the coach Italiano, who has been working since the summer of 2024, justified his appointment back then by winning the Coppa Italia. Now the club has already lost its title in that competition, and in the league, after a promising start, there was a very prolonged slump — now even 7th place looks out of reach. So they can focus on the Europa League. There the Italians collected four wins and 15 points in the main round (their only defeat came against Aston Villa in the first round), after which in February they beat Brann twice in the first playoff round, both times by a 1–0 score.
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Roma do not consider this tournament their top priority. The Giallorossi, with Ranieri — who was already the third coach during the previous season — finished just one point behind Juventus in the battle for 4th place in the last Serie A campaign. The current coach Gasperini, who moved from Atalanta in the summer, clearly prioritizes lifting his new side into the top four of Italian football. Recently Roma have shown fairly confident form in the league, regularly collecting points and remaining firmly in the race for Champions League places. Even in difficult matches they often manage to control the game well enough to secure positive results, which keeps them among the leading contenders. Things are going quite well, although the competition is extremely tight. So it is not surprising that they almost sacrificed the domestic cup, where they were eliminated immediately after losing 2–3 at home to Torino. In the Europa League the team from Rome also did not always use their strongest lineup. But after losing twice in the first three rounds (Lille and Viktoria Plzeň, following a victory in Nice), they then managed to win four matches in a row. So even though they finished the round with a draw against Panathinaikos, the Romans still entered the top eight of the main stage and will only now begin their playoff campaign.
Naturally, the fellow countrymen have faced each other often. In 2025 alone there was a draw in Bologna and a home victory for the Giallorossi. The visitors look more solid overall — the pick here is Roma with a 0 handicap.
Prediction for the match: AS Roma to win with 0.0 handicap.
