Serie A predictions and predicted lineups, matchday 3: Inter vs Napoli without McTominay, Juventus vs Milan on Sunday

Serie A restarts on Friday night and runs through to Monday. Ten games, two heavyweight fixtures — Inter vs Napoli at 16:00 on Saturday and Juventus vs Milan on Sunday evening — and six teams still on maximum points about to open the season's first real gap.

It is also the first round after the window shut, and it shows: new faces appear all over the predicted lineups. Kevin De Bruyne starts for Napoli, Moise Kean for Como, Andrea Pinamonti for Lazio, Adrien Rabiot for Milan.

Who is missing: McTominay and Thuram

Scott McTominay will not be at San Siro. Napoli have announced that the Scot is undergoing a corrective ablation procedure after a mild benign arrhythmia: he misses four games and returns after the first international break, so October. He addressed it himself: «I'm fine, the procedure was something I'd planned to do with the club for quite a while». We covered it when he came off against Como.

The other one belongs to Juventus: Khephren Thuram has had surgery on his right knee in Lyon for patellar chondropathy and will be out for at least four months, with a return expected in 2027. McKennie, Yildiz and Gatti are missing too: Juventus meet Milan with half a midfield gone, and Douglas Luiz and Locatelli look like the pair in the middle.

Milan in turn are without Leao through a muscle problem, and Napoli, beyond McTominay, have no Buongiorno and no Marianucci.

Friday and Saturday

Genoa vs Como opens the round at 18:45 on Friday. Genoa are still on zero; Como come off a 2-1 win at the Maradona, have four points and now have Kean up front. Our read: fewer than 3.5 goals.

At 13:00 on Saturday, Fiorentina vs Torino puts two sides on zero against each other, and it already carries weight: Fiorentina are bottom and have yet to score. We say fewer than 4.5 goals.

Then the main event: Inter vs Napoli at 16:00. Inter have won both and look set for a 3-5-2 with Lautaro Martinez and Pio Esposito up front; Napoli answer with a 4-3-3 and De Bruyne in midfield. Our call is Inter to score at least once.

Saturday closes with Roma vs Atalanta at 18:45, first against fifth. Roma lead with eight scored and none conceded, with Dybala, Mora and Malen ahead; Atalanta won 1-0 through Samardzic in the 96th minute. We say Roma to score at least once.

Sunday

Two games at 13:00: Parma vs Monza between two sides on zero (fewer than 3.5 goals) and Frosinone vs Venezia, where Frosinone arrive off a 3-0 win in Florence and Venezia have no points and no goals. Here we expect at least two goals.

At 16:00, Bologna vs Sassuolo: Bologna sit on zero points and zero goals after two rounds, Sassuolo beat Torino and have Berardi back. Fewer than 4.5 goals.

And at 18:45, Juventus vs Milan, the game of the round alongside the one at San Siro. Between the absences on both sides and the weight of the occasion, our read is fewer than 4.5 goals.

Monday

Cagliari vs Lecce at 16:30 (fewer than 3.5 goals) and Udinese vs Lazio at 18:45 (fewer than 3.5 goals), with Udinese getting Kabasele back in defence and Lazio starting Pinamonti through the middle.

The predicted lineups, game by game

Genoa - Como

Genoa (3-4-2-1)
Justin Bijlow, Alessandro Marcandalli, Leo Østigård, Johan Vásquez, Mikael Ellertsson, Morten Frendrup, Djibril Sow, Mario Mitaj, Tommaso Baldanzi, Vitinha, Lorenzo Colombo

Como (4-2-3-1)
Jean Butez, Yan Couto, Trevoh Chalobah, Jacobo Ramón, Álex Valle, Máximo Perrone, Lucas Da Cunha, Assane Diao, Nico Paz, Martin Baturina, Moise Kean

Fiorentina - Torino

Fiorentina (4-3-3)
David De Gea, Álex Jiménez, Radu Drăguşin, Viery, Víctor Valdepeñas, Cher Ndour, Christ Inao Oulaï, Arthur Atta, Franco Mastantuono, Mateo Pellegrino, Alieu Njie

Torino (3-4-2-1)
Lucas Perri, Pietro Comuzzo, Saúl Coco, Eray Cömert, Rafik Belghali, Gvidas Gineitis, Kian Fitz-Jim, Alessio Cacciamani, Nikola Vlašić, Che Adams, Giovanni Simeone

Inter - Napoli

Inter (3-5-2)
Josep Martínez, Yann Bisseck, Manuel Akanji, Alessandro Bastoni, Andy Diouf, Nicolò Barella, Hakan Çalhanoğlu, Piotr Zieliński, Federico Dimarco, Lautaro Martínez, Pio Esposito

Napoli (4-3-3)
Alex Meret, Giovanni Di Lorenzo, Amir Rrahmani, Rafa Marín, Leonardo Spinazzola, Frank Anguissa, Stanislav Lobotka, Kevin De Bruyne, Matteo Politano, Rasmus Højlund, Alisson Santos

Roma - Atalanta

Roma (3-4-2-1)
Mile Svilar, Gianluca Mancini, Daniele Ghilardi, Mario Hermoso, Nahuel Molina, Manu Koné, Bryan Cristante, Wesley, Paulo Dybala, Rodrigo Mora, Donyell Malen

Atalanta (4-3-3)
Marco Carnesecchi, Raoul Bellanova, Odilon Kossounou, Giorgio Scalvini, Lorenzo Bernasconi, Lazar Samardžić, Gianluca Gaetano, Éderson, Charles De Ketelaere, Gianluca Scamacca, Jonathan Rowe

Parma - Monza

Parma (3-5-2)
Edoardo Corvi, Enrico Delprato, Mariano Troilo, Diego Carlos, Sascha Britschgi, Adrián Bernabé, Mandela Keita, Christian Ordoñez, Emanuele Valeri, David Romero, El Bilal Touré

Monza (3-4-3)
Noel Törnqvist, Jan Ziółkowski, Lorenzo Lucchesi, Andrea Carboni, Samuele Birindelli, Michael Folorunsho, Ebenezer Akinsanmiro, Ricardo Mangas, Andrea Colpani, Patrick Cutrone, Cyril Ngonge

Frosinone - Venezia

Frosinone (4-3-3)
Lorenzo Palmisani, Anthony Oyono, Gabriele Calvani, Ilario Monterisi, Gabriele Bracaglia, Patrizio Masini, Romano Schmid, Giacomo Calò, Seydou Fini, Antonio Raimondo, Giorgi Kvernadze

Venezia (3-5-2)
Filip Stanković, Joel Schingtienne, Armel Bella-Kotchap, Redouane Halhal, Pasquale Mazzocchi, Kike Pérez, Gianluca Busio, Toma Bašić, Ridgeciano Haps, John Yeboah, Akor Adams

Bologna - Sassuolo

Bologna (4-2-3-1)
Łukasz Skorupski, Nadir Zortea, Torbjørn Heggem, Arthur Theate, Juan Miranda, Tommaso Pobega, Lewis Ferguson, Federico Bernardeschi, Jens Odgaard, Nicolò Cambiaghi, Roberto Piccoli

Sassuolo (4-3-3)
Arijanet Murić, Ignace Van der Brempt, Jay Idzes, Fedde Leysen, Josh Doig, Vasilije Adžić, Nemanja Matić, Darryl Bakola, Domenico Berardi, Kieron Bowie, Armand Laurienté

Juventus - Milan

Juventus (4-2-3-1)
Guglielmo Vicario, Pierre Kalulu, Gleison Bremer, Jhon Lucumí, Zeki Çelik, Douglas Luiz, Manuel Locatelli, Francisco Conceição, Nicolás González, Jérémie Boga, Randal Kolo Muani

Milan (3-4-2-1)
Mike Maignan, Mario Gila, Koni De Winter, Strahinja Pavlović, Samuel Chukwueze, Luka Modrić, Yunus Musah, Davide Bartesaghi, Adrien Rabiot, Alphadjo Cissè, Gonçalo Ramos

Cagliari - Lecce

Cagliari (4-2-3-1)
Elia Caprile, Zé Pedro, Alessandro Deiola, Juan Rodríguez, Adam Obert, Harry Winks, Alessandro Romano, Michel Adopo, Daniel Maldini, Jacopo Fazzini, Kevin Carlos Omoruyi

Lecce (4-3-3)
Wladimiro Falcone, Danilo Veiga, Kialonda Gaspar, Tiago Gabriel, Antonino Gallo, Lassana Coulibaly, Ivan Ilić, Olaf Gorter, Santiago Pierotti, Nikola Štulić, N'Dri Konan

Udinese - Lazio

Udinese (3-4-2-1)
Maduka Okoye, James Abankwah, Christian Kabasele, Oumar Solet, Mërgim Vojvoda, Jakub Piotrowski, Jesper Karlström, Hassane Kamara, Unai Gómez, Jürgen Ekkelenkamp, Keinan Davis

Lazio (4-3-3)
Christos Mandas, Romano Floriani Mussolini, Danilho Doekhi, Oliver Provstgaard, Nuno Tavares, Davide Frattesi, Reda Belahyane, Kenneth Taylor, Gustav Isaksen, Andrea Pinamonti, Mattia Zaccagni

Predicted lineups can change until an hour before kick-off, when the official teamsheets are released.

The individual calls

We have published twelve. The clearest: Donyell Malen over 2.5 shots against Atalanta — he leads the scoring charts with five — and Lautaro Martinez over 2.5 shots against Napoli.

Then Douvikas in Genoa, Raimondo and Yeboah in Frosinone vs Venezia, Bowie in Bologna, and for Juventus vs Milan Locatelli on fouls, Conceição on shots and Gonçalo Ramos on shots on target. All twelve are in the predicted lineups.

On Monday we count every one

As always, the moment the round ends we publish the tally: how many calls we had online and how many landed, with none removed. In matchday 2 it was twenty-six correct out of thirty. The full record, one by one and filterable, is in the results history.

Our analysis stays updated until kick-off on the Serie A page, and the individual calls are in the Player Predictions section.