Palermo vs Fiorentina

Palermo and Fiorentina will face off at the Stadio Renzo Barbera in a match between two sides looking to overcome recent obstacles. Fiorentina had gotten off to a blazing start with an 11 match unbeaten run to start their campaign but are now winless over their last 3 matches with 2 losses over that stretch. Meanwhile, Palermo have won just 1 of their last 5 matches and are losers of 2 in a row during which time they have been outscored by a count of 8-1.

Francesco Guidolin’s side last won a match at home back in week 12 when they held serve against Napoli by a score of 2-1. The next two matches were a 5-0 loss away to Juventus and then a 3-1 loss last week away to Catania. That loss was extremely painful as it was a derby match for Palermo. They have now dropped to 11^th place with 18 points and sit just behind 10^th place Catania. While midfielder Fabio Caserta will be out suspended this week, Guidolin will once again be able to count on Pisano, Fabrizio Miccoli and the Uruguayan Edison Cavani who all missed out on the derby. The formation against the purple side is expected to be a 4-3-2-1 with Amauri as the long striker. However, this is really more of a 4-3-3 as both Miccoli and Cavani who will play behind Amauri can be considered strikers.

As for Fiorentina manager Cesare Prandelli, he has a number of injury concerns particularly with the back line. Ujfalusi and Kroldrup are both out which leaves Dainelli and Gamberini as the choices to partner at the center back position. This is not exactly what Prandelli needed when looking to snap the club’s current 3 match winless run. The bright spot is that Montolivo will return to the left side of midfield. It was hoped that the return of Romanian Adrian Mutu to the attack in the match against Inter Milan would inspire the Fiorentina attack but they stumbled once more before losing 2-0. The have now been kept scoreless in back to back matches and have scored just one goal over the last 270 minutes. They will be hoping that having both Mutu and Montolivo back on the left flank will help make their ball movement more fluent and cohesive.

With both clubs going through similar down periods this match has draw written all over it. A point at home for Palermo against Fiorentina at this point in the season would be nothing to sneeze at and Fiorentina do sport the 3^rd best defense in Serie A along with a top notch keeper in Sebastian Frey.

Prediction: draw 0-0