Title favourites Fiorentina travel to the Bozsik Arena for their Conference League Round of 16 first-leg clash against Maccabi Haifa.
Fiorentina are in the hunt to clinch silverware and they came closer than ever to lift the Conference League title last season but lost the final to Premier League outfits West Ham. Vincenzo Italiano’s men went unbeaten in their group-stage actions but three draws took away the momentum from their sails and they were fortunate enough to see challengers Ferencvaros and Genk failing to have an inconsistent campaign. The Viola managed to stay afloat in the race to qualify for Europe next season with recent wins over Frosinone and Lazio. Currently sitting 8th in the Serie A standings, the Florence-based side are one point away from 7th-placed Napoli and nine points away from the top-four places. Champions League qualification is too much to ask from them at this stage but a Europa League spot remains quite on the cards.
Meanwhile, Maccabi Haifa arrive in this competition after dropping out of the Europa League. They finished third in their group behind Villarreal and Stade Rennes who registered 13 and 12 points respectively. Messay Dego’s men averted a possible exit from European competition after eliminating Gent in the Conference League playoff round. The Israeli outfits proved effective against Serie A opponents last campaign as they managed to post a 2-0 scoreline against Juventus. They will hope to repeat the same against Fiorentina and pull off an upset.
Here are the predicted line-ups for the match according to Gianluca Di Marzio:
Maccabi Haifa (4-3-3): Kaiuf; Khalaili, Feingold, Seck, Gershon; Saief, Show, Mohamed; Khalaili, Pierrot, Rafaelov.
Fiorentina (4-2-3-1): Terracciano; Faraoni, Milenkovic, Ranieri, Parisi; Duncan, Mandragora; N. Gonzalez, Beltran, Ikone; Nzola.
Trambak Bhattacherjee | GIFN
