Inter travel to the Stadio San Paolo to face Napoli on Sunday at 20:45 CET in Serie A, looking to bring an end to the hold their opponents have over them.
The Nerazzurri have won just one of the last 11 meetings between the two sides, with Napoli winning each of the last five games on at the San Paolo including a 1-0 Coppa Italia quarter final victory in February.
The reverse league fixture back in October ended 2-2 with an injury time Hernanes equaliser marking the end of a crazy last 11 minutes, which saw four goals, go in.
The management at Inter may have changed since then with the arrival of Roberto Mancini but results have scarcely improved; inconsistency has reigned this season with three wins and three defeats in the last six games perfectly summing up the campaign so far.
Inter sit ninth in Serie A on 35 points after a 1-0 home defeat to Fiorentina last weeked, and are ten points behind Sunday’s hosts who currently occupy the third place that the Biscione so crave for Champions League qualification.
Napoli themselves have also been plagued by inconsistency, with losses to the likes of Torino and Palermo leaving them just two points clear of the chasing pack, but the Vesuviani have won seven of their last 10 league games and their only draw since early December came in Wednesday’s Coppa Italia semi-final first leg at Lazio.
Rafa Benitez’s side have the worst defence in the top eight having shipped 31 goals this season, and Sunday’s fixture could bring goals with two of Serie A’s most prolific Argentines going head to head in Mauro Icardi and Gonzalo Higuain, who have 14 and 12 goals each respectively.
Both coaches are set to make changes to their teams with Faouzi Ghoulam and Gokhan Inler for Ivan Strinic and David Lopez expected to be Napoli’s only two changes from the side that lost at Torino last Sunday.
Inter look likely to make three changes from the disappointing defeat to the Viola last time out with captain Andrea Ranocchia set to replace Nemanja Vidic, and Xherdan Shaqiri and Rodrigo Palacio ready to replace the disappointing Mateo Kovacic and Lukas Podolski.
Form Guide: Napoli (W-W-W-L-W-L), Inter (L-L-W-W-W-L)
Expected Starting XIs
Napoli: Andujar, Maggio, Koulibaly, Albiol, Ghoulam, Gargano, Inler, Callejon, Hamsik, de Guzman, Higuain
Inter: Handanovic, Campagnaro, Ranocchia, Juan Jesus, Santon, Guarin, Medel, Brozovic, Shaqiri, Icardi, Palacio
