Lazio vs Apollon Limassol Predictions

Lazio have enjoyed a mixed start to the season, bouncing back after early defeats. However, their poor start to the new campaign seemed to stem from their final day’s disappointment last term, when they missed out on the Champions League. A loss at home to Inter saw the Aquile fail to make the top four, and left them in the Europa League for another season. Climbing up to the top level of European football is their main concern, but can they mount a challenge to win UEFA’s second tier trophy?

Lazio start their Europa League campaign against Apollon on Thursday night. The Italian side have got bigger fish to fry domestically, but they will want to keep their options open, given that this competition offers a backdoor in to next season’s Champions League. They did impress in this competition last term while juggling a top four charge domestically, as they reached the last eight of the competition before being shocked by Red Bull Salzburg.

Meanwhile, Apollon have experience of meeting Italian sides, after clashing with Atalanta in this competition last season. However, the Cypriot side didn’t last too long in the Europa League, exiting with a whimper. They went out after back to back defeats to nil. That run continued in to their opening qualifier – which they lost 1-0 – before regrouping to make it this far. However, are the visitors set to struggle in front of goal here?

Lazio tended to be an attack-minded side who could punish sides, given their impressive array of forward talent. However, the Aquile didn’t always utilise their strikers in this stage of the Europa League last season. However, their defence didn’t change all that often, which brought wins to nil in their opening two home matches in last season’s Europa League. They’ll be chasing another win here, and it’s hard to see the outsiders making too much of an impact.

Lazio have regained their domestic form, which has seen them priced up as heavy favourites here. The Aquile managed to claim back to back 1-0 wins over Frosinone and Empoli, as they recovered from losses against last season’s top two in Serie A. We think that the back to basics approach which has helped in Lazio of late will come good here, so we’re backing a home win to nil on Thursday night.