Leicester City are set to open their new Europa League campaign at home against an in-form Napoli at the King’s Power on Thursday with kickoff at 22:00.
The Foxes earned an automatic qualification to the Europa League following their fifth-placed finish in the Premier League last season. Leicester narrowly missed out on the Champions League as the conceded a defeat in the closing Premier League fixture that left them in a Europa League spot.
Brendan Rodgers’ side have made a mixed start to their new league campaign and posted two wins and two defeats leaving them in the ninth position with six points so far and they head into the Thursday’s clash off the back of an entertaining 1-0 defeat to Man City last weekend.
Brendan and his side will now shift their focus to the Europa League where they will be looking to qualify to go further up the knockout stages having been knocked out in the second leg of the last 32 by Slavia Prague last term. He’ll want to do better this season as they look to hit the ground running but they face a highly motivated Luciano Spalleti’s side that are enjoying an excellent form.
Napoli defeated Juventus 2-1 in the Serie A last time out to continue their strong and impressive start to the new campaign. The Neapolitan giants have recorded three wins in their opening three matches which leaves them sitting in the third spot with nine points level with both Roma and Milan who have superior goal differences.
It is no secret that Napoli are among the most consistent attacking forces in Europe and will be looking to secure their first win in the group in the clash against Leicester as they look to go further up the tournament than they did last term.
Napoli head into the match in a brilliant form as they have just lost one match of their last 17 matches and remain unbeaten in their last seven Europa League group stage fixtures on the road, winning five in a row before the 1-1 draw at AZ.
Both sides are among the favorites to win the tournament this campaign which makes the match an interesting and one the most intriguing matches on Thursday night.
Leicester vs Napoli head to head
This will be the first time these two go head to head in any competition.
Home
- Leicester 0-1 Man City
- Norwich 1-2 Leicester
- West Ham 4-1 Leicester
- Leicester 1-0 Wolves
- Leicester 1-0 Man City
Away
- Napoli 2-1 Juventus
- Napoli 1-5 Benevento
- Genoa 1-2 Napoli
- Napoli 2-0 Venezia
- Napoli 2-1 Ascoli
Leicester team news
Leicester City have all they players present for the match.
Napoli team news
Napoli will be without a number of their players including Alex Meret, Stanislav Lobotka, Diego Demme, Dries Mertens and Faouzi Ghoulam due to injuries while captain Lorenzo Insigne is listed as a doubt.
Prediction and odds
- Draw
- Both sides to score
- Goals over 2.5