Correa always plays incredible against us. Was hoping he wasn't going to be available for this...
I don't think they'll play with all three of Luis Alberto, Sergej and Correa. One of them to be dropped maybe for Parolo? If not they'll be pretty unbalanced away from home. Feels like something they'd want to do later in the game looking for a goal, not from the start.
Not sure how I feel about this game. Lulic is key for them and if Calabria and Kessie can stop him overloading the left with Luis Alberto and the other attackers then we'll be ok. I'm not too worried about Romulo on the other side. He'll get a lot of chances to to cross but his delivery is usually weak and he's not fast enough to scare Rodriguez with pace. My only worry with him is a Borini marking brainfart where he stops tracking his player for no reason...
I really don't want us to revert to Suso finding the right cross to Piatek. We can threaten that move but a better option is someone overlapping on the right behind Bastos and get a low cross that Acerbi can't deal with, something like the Piatek goal against Empoli. If we try to cross all the time we're not fast enough to do that before their defense gets in shape and they'll ALWAYS get ahead of Piatek as they're bigger and stronger.
Gattuso has to be afraid of their counters. I'm sure Bakayoko won't be seen much in the final third. He'll be single minded in looking for any counter-pressing opportunities, especially against Sergej. I also think Rodriguez will be less adventurous than usual, meaning he'll probably be part of a back three when we're in possession, with Borini tasked with tracking Romulo.
I think this game will be won in midfield. If we constantly stop Sergej from transitioning counterattacks (through legal means or otherwise) then we'll be ok. If we get a couple of yellow cards early it will be very tough.