Inter Milan vs Livorno

The Inter Milan express continues to march on without hesitation and this week the neroazzurri open up week 23 at home to Livorno in a most favorable match up at the Giuseppe Meazza. They will be looking to extend their current unbeaten run to 23 straight matches. Livorno have been better of late but are still within reach of the sides in the relegation zone.

There are not enough superlatives to describe how Inter Milan have played this season. Manager Roberto Mancini has his club in 1^st place of Serie A with 56 points from their 22 matches. They hold an 8 point lead over 2^nd place AS Roma. They have been almost perfect at home with 10 wins from 11 matches while posting and awesome 27 goals scored and 7 conceded. Last week they scored another impressive win on the road by a score of 0-2 at Catania. It was their third straight contest without conceding a goal. This week Patrick Vieira is out suspended, while Dacourt, Walter Samuel and Cesar are out due to injury. Meanwhile Maicon and Stankovic have improved and have a chance of being included in the squad list.

Livorno were held to a disappointing 1-1 tie at home in week 22 by Geona at the Armando Picchi. That makes it 2 draws in a row for Livorno and they now sit in 15^th place of the league table with 23 points on the season. They are just behind Catania on goal difference and 3 points ahead of 16^th place Siena. The side managed by Camolese have now gone 4 matches without a victory. Ironically, Livorno actually have more wins on the road with 3 to their 2 home wins but the task appears quite difficult this week as they will be taking on a bonafide juggernaut. Making matters worse, their top scorer Tavano is not expected to be available.

It is asking a lot from Livorno to win away to Inter Milan this week. They do not have the overall depth of talent from top to bottom of the squad to seriously challenge a world class squad like Inter Milan and it will take an absolutely perfect match from them to pull off a victory. That would have been the case even if Tavano were able to start. Look for Inter Milan to continue to roll.

Prediction: Inter (2-0)