Italian football returned in dramatic fashion on Sunday night as Lazio beat Juventus 3-2 to win the Italian Super Cup. Simone Inzaghi’s side appeared to be cruising at 2-0 up with five minutes remaining before two goals from Pablo Dybala turned the game on its head. With almost the last kick of the game Alessandro Murgia converted Jordan Lukaku’s cross to give Lazio a famous victory over Juventus and spark wild celebrations.
Despite their loss in the Super Cup, Juventus will start the season as huge favourites for the title, meaning that betting on them to win it is not worth it. An interesting market though is Serie A Winners Without Juventus as there are a number of clubs vying to finish second in the table including Napoli, Roma and a resurgent AC Milan. Below are the odds that Ladbrokes are offering for this market and as you can see, there could be money to be made.
Napoli start as favourites to finish in second place, despite finishing a point behind Roma in third place last time around. The Naples club have been consistently excellent in each of the last two seasons and have a quality squad including the likes of Marek Hamsik, Dries Mertens, Jose Callejon and Lorenzo Insigne. The odds of 13/8 on offer with Ladbrokes aren’t too appealing to me and I think they are a little short considering the quality of some of the other teams in the race.
AC Milan start the season at odds of 10/3 to finish in second place and they are the team I am backing to finish as runners up to Juventus. AC Milan are one of the most successful teams in Italian football and under the new ownership of Li Yonghong, they appear determined to get back to where they belong after a few fallow years.
The club have already spent 200 million Euros this summer on the likes of Leonardo Bonucci, Andre Silva, Andrea Conti and Franck Kessie and they don’t appear to be stopping there with Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang expected to sign in the coming days. If AC Milan do get that deal over the line, then they will have a quality squad and could even compete with Juventus for the league title. I think the 10/3 odds on offer are extremely long considering the team they have and I am expecting them to do very well this season.
Roma finished in second place last season, but are only third favourites to repeat that feat this time around. There is no doubting that they have a fantastic team in midfield and attack with the likes of Edin Dzeko, Daniele De Rossi, Radja Nainggolan and Kevin Strootman, but in defence and the goalkeeping position they do not have the same level of players. They have brought in Aleksander Kolarov from Manchester City this window, but you would expect the capital city club to struggle defensively this season without a top class goalkeeper or central defender.
Overall, looking at the odds, I think AC Milan represent the best value considering the team they have and if they do bring in Aubameyang, then their odds will get even shorter, so get your bets on now!