Napoli v Roma: Preview, predicted line-ups & team news

Napoli have spent the opening weeks of the season looking for a settled identity, and a 1-0 defeat at bottom-club Venezia seven days ago did nothing to help. It was their third loss in seven Serie A games and left them tenth.

Roma arrive in Naples from the other end of the mood spectrum. They are third, unbeaten, and have kept five clean sheets in seven league matches. A 2-0 home win over Genoa last Saturday kept the pressure on Inter and Lazio at the top.

The hosts have the better home record of the two sides' recent fixtures, with five goals scored and two conceded in three games at the Maradona. Roma's away form is the more striking number: three games, six scored, none conceded.

Napoli's season has been a run of one step forward and one step back. They beat Frosinone 3-0 on 10 October, then went to Venezia and failed to score. Before that came a 1-1 draw at Fiorentina and a 3-2 defeat at Inter, in which they at least found the net twice.

At home they have won two of three, with the only loss a 2-1 defeat to Como on 30 August. They have 10 points from seven games, 13 goals short of nothing but three points off the pack of sides on 13. That is close enough to catch up, but another slip here would leave them looking down as much as up.

Their underlying numbers are better than the table suggests. Napoli average 1.81 expected goals and 16.7 shots per game, and have conceded 1.29 xG. They have scored 10 and conceded seven.

Roma have won five and drawn two of their seven, scoring 16 and conceding three, a goal difference of plus 13 that is the best in the division. They have not lost a league game, and their only draws came away at Como (0-0) and at home to Inter (2-2).

They sit two points behind joint-leaders Inter and Lazio on 19, and two clear of AC Milan in fourth. A win in Naples would put them level on points with the top two before those sides play. Rodrigo Mora is the man Napoli's back line must watch.

Napoli's last seven league games read three wins, one draw and three defeats, with 10 goals scored and seven conceded. Roma's read five wins, two draws and no defeats, with 16 scored and three conceded. On the surface that is a clear gap. The xG figures narrow it a little: Napoli create 1.81 per game to Roma's 2.18, and they concede 1.29 to Roma's 1.06. Roma are winning with a margin to spare, but Napoli have had the better of the shot count in some of their losses, and a side with that attacking output rarely stays this inconsistent for long.

Roma are third on 17 points from seven games, two behind Inter and Lazio on 19 and two ahead of AC Milan on 15. A win would keep them firmly in the Champions League places and in the title conversation.

Napoli are tenth on 10 points from seven, seven points behind Roma and five off fourth-placed Milan. Sixth to eighth are all on 13, so three points would take Napoli level with that group. A defeat would leave them within a few points of Atalanta and Lecce on nine, and the early-season frustration would harden into something harder to shift.

The last ten meetings produced four Napoli wins, five draws and one Roma win. Goals are scarce in this fixture: an average of 2.0 per game, with both teams scoring in half of them and more than 2.5 goals in only three. The most recent meeting, at the Maradona on 15 February 2026, finished 2-2. Napoli won 1-0 in Rome on 30 November 2025.

The pattern points to a tight game. Roma's solid defence and Napoli's patchy results both favour a low-scoring match, and the Under 2.5 line at 9/10 looks the sound end of the goals market. The BTTS number is a coin flip historically, and a 1-1 draw, priced at 5/1, sits right on the most common result in this fixture.

The biggest gap between the sides is at the back. Roma average 0.43 goals conceded per game and have 2.57 corners against, while Napoli concede 1.0 and 4.29 corners. Roma have shut out opponents in five of seven games, to Napoli's three.

In attack Roma average 2.29 goals per game to Napoli's 1.43, and have a 6.0 to 5.57 edge in shots on target. Napoli do win the corner count, 6.43 to 5.14, and that suggests they will push Roma back for stretches. The question is whether they can turn pressure into chances against a side that has conceded just once in the 46-60 minute window less than twice in total.

Napoli v Roma kicks off at 17:00 BST on Saturday 24 October at the Stadio Diego Armando Maradona. A UK broadcaster has not been confirmed for this fixture yet, and this page will be updated closer to kick-off.

The value sits in the quiet markets. Both sides have strong reasons to cancel each other out, with Roma's defence and Napoli's home record meeting head on, and five draws in ten meetings back that up. The goals lines from bet365 reflect that, with Over 2.5 and Under 2.5 almost level. We lean towards the draw and the Under, with Rodrigo Mora the one player likely to find a gap.