Fiorentina will be looking to bounce back from Saturday's defeat against Inter Milan when they continue their 2020-21 Serie A campaign at home to Sampdoria on Friday night.
La Viola were on the wrong end of a 4-3 scoreline at San Siro last time out but will be eyeing their second league victory of the season when they welcome Sampdoria to Sadio Artemio Franchi.
Match preview
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Fiorentina finished 10th in Serie A last season, improving on their 16th-place finish in 2018-19, but it would be fair to say that the Purple One are still some way off returning to being a top-four side.
La Viola made a positive start to their 2020-21 campaign, recording a 1-0 victory at home to Torino, but as mentioned, they suffered a 4-3 defeat at Inter on Saturday night.
An incredibly open game actually saw Fiorentina lead 1-0 and 3-2 on the night, with Federico Chiesa netting a third for the visitors just past the hour mark in Milan.
Romelu Lukaku levelled the scores in the 87th minute, though, before Danilo D'Ambrosio scored an 89th-minute winner as Giuseppe Iachini's side were beaten in their second game of the season.
Fiorentina will be looking to return to winning ways on Friday and should be in a confident mood, having recorded a 5-1 victory when they last faced Sampdoria in Serie A back in February.
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Sampdoria, meanwhile, have lost each of their first two league games of the season, suffering a 3-0 defeat away to Juventus on September 20 before Benevento beat them 3-2 last time out.
Claudio Ranieri's side led 2-0 against Benevento on home soil, but the visitors then netted three times without reply to pick up a huge three points, meaning that La Samp are pointless at this stage.
Sampdoria have not been out of Italy's top flight since the 2011-12 campaign, but they finished 15th last season, which was their lowest position at this level for four years.
It is difficult to imagine Ranieri's side dropping out of Serie A due to the quality that they can call upon but another poor result this weekend would certainly leave the fans slightly concerned.
Fiorentina Serie A form: WL
Sampdoria Serie A form: LL
Team News
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Fiorentina had feared that Franck Ribery could miss out on Friday due to the ankle injury that the experienced Frenchman picked up during the defeat to Inter.
Ribery has returned to training this week, though, meaning that he should be available for this contest.
La Viola's squad is in excellent shape at the moment in terms of injuries, and it would not be a surprise to see the same XI sent onto the field from the clash with Inter.
Nikola Milenkovic is said to be the subject of a £20m offer from West Ham United, but the central defender is expected to feature for the home side in this match.
Sampdoria, meanwhile, will be without new signing Keita Balde as the recent arrival from Monaco has coronavirus, meaning that he is currently undergoing a period of quarantine.
Ranieri's side are otherwise in good shape, though, having not picked up any issues against Benevento, while Kristoffer Askildsen is available following a suspension.
Fabio Quagliarella should again be joined by Federico Bonazzoli in the final third of the field, although former Southampton striker Manolo Gabbiadini is another option in attack.
Fiorentina possible starting lineup:
Dragowski; Milenkovic, Ceccherini, Caceres; Chiesa, Bonaventura, Amrabat, Castrovilli, Biraghi; Ribery, Kouame
Sampdoria possible starting lineup:
Audero; Bereszynski, Tonelli, Colley, Augello; Candreva, Ekdal, Verre, Jankto; Quagliarella, Bonazzoli
We say: Fiorentina 2-0 Sampdoria
Fiorentina would certainly have been pleased with aspects of their performance against Inter, but Sampdoria have been disappointing in their opening two matches. We fully expect the hosts to emerge victorious in this match, backing them to record a two-goal success.
Top betting tip
Our expert tipster partners at Sporita.com are predicting under 3.5 goals in this match. Click here to find out what else they are predicting for this game and for more of their tried-and-tested football tips.Under 3.5:dataData Analysis
Our analysis of all available data, including recent performances and player stats up until an hour before kickoff, suggested the most likely outcome of this match was a Fiorentina win with a probability of 58.14%. A draw had a probability of 22.5% and a win for Sampdoria had a probability of 19.33%.
The most likely scoreline for a Fiorentina win was 1-0 with a probability of 11.09%. The next most likely scorelines for that outcome were 2-0 (10.25%) and 2-1 (9.89%). The likeliest drawn scoreline was 1-1 (10.69%), while for a Sampdoria win it was 0-1 (5.79%). The actual scoreline of 1-2 was predicted with a 5.2% likelihood.
