Riding a 12-game winless run at the Stadio Via del Mare, Lecce are out to end that on Sunday afternoon but won’t have it easy against Antonio Conte’s Inter.
PROBABLE LINE-UPS
Lecce (4-3-1-2): Gabriel; Meccariello, Rossettini, Lucioni, Donati; Petriccione, Tachtsidis, Deiola; Mancosu; Lapadula, Babacar.
Unavailable: Farias, Calderoni, Shakov, Falco.
Inter (3-5-2): Handanovic; Skriniar, De Vrij, Bastoni; Candreva, Barella, Brozovic, Sensi, Biraghi; Lautaro Martinez, Lukaku.
Unavailable: D’Ambrosio.
KEY STATISTICS
– Lecce have scored only thee goals in their last nine Serie A games against Inter, never more than one per match: the Nerazzurri have won seven such meetings, one draw and the Giallorossi securing one win.
– Lecce have picked up four points in their last two home games against Inter in Serie A: the Giallorossi have never gone unbeaten in three home meetings in a row against the Nerazzurri.
– Lecce have lost each of their last four league games: the last time they lost five games in a row in Serie A was in November 2005.
– Lecce are winless in their last 12 home games in Serie A (D4 L8): only once have they endured a streak of 13 consecutive home games without wins in the Italian top flight, in 2009.
– On both the two previous occasions which Inter picked up at least 46 points in the opening 19 matches of a Serie A campaign in the three points for a win era (since 1994/95), they won the Scudetto at the end of the season (2006/07 and 2007/08).
– Inter have picked up 25 points out of the 27 available in their opening nine away games in Serie A current season: previously the Nerazzurri had never won more than 23 points on the road at this stage.
– Antonio Conte has won 14 of his first 19 Serie A games as Inter coach, fewer than just Alfredo Foni (1952/53) and Giovanni Invernizzi (1970/71) after as many matches for the Nerazzurri.
– Inter have spent the most minutes in leading situations in Serie A this season (917), having also been trailing only 107 minutes, only Juventus (102) have spent fewer minutes in such positions – in the first half of the previous Serie A campaign, the Nerazzurri spent just 578 minutes leading games.
– Lecce striker Khouma Babacar has scored four goals against Inter in Serie A, his joint most against a single side in the Italian top flight – he also bagged his last Serie A brace against the Nerazzurri, in April 2017.
– Inter striker Romelu Lukaku scored his first Serie A goal against Lecce earlier this season – in his final season in the Premier league, he only scored in both fixtures against a single side (Southampton).
Source: forzaitalianfootball.com