Lazio quest to keep the UEFA Europa Conference League (UECL) trophy in Rome by emulating their city rivals Roma, who took the trophy home last season, continued with a 1-0 aggregate victory over Cluj in the knockout round. Those two legs form part of a run of impressive defensive displays that have seen Lazio notch an incredible streak of around eight hours of play without conceding a goal (W4, D1), which includes a 1-0 win against runaway Serie A leaders Napoli last time out.
Maurizio Sarri’s side have already faced Dutch opposition this season, with the home side on the day winning both of their Europa League group stage games against Feyenoord, which kept Lazio’s all-time record against Dutch sides perfectly balanced (W3, D2, L3). With just one defeat from the four Rome-held games in that sequence (W2, D1, L1), Lazio may be confident of justifying their favourites status against Eredivisie high fliers AZ Alkmaar.
Sidestepping the play-off round due to their group-topping performance (W5, L1), the AZ Alkmaar squad gave a round of applause when drawn against Lazio “due to the size of the club” according to boss Pascal Jansen. They’ll do well not to be overawed by the occasion though, as the Eredivisie title hopefuls look to emulate fellow Dutch club Feyenoord who reached the UECL final last season.
A positive all-time record against Italian opponents may give the Cheese Heads hope (W3, D1, L2), but they will likely need to churn out better form than across their last three competitive away games (W1, D1, L1) if they’re to put one foot into their first European quarter-final since 2013/14. If the story of AZ Alkmaar European games this term is to continue in a similar vein, we may well find a winner one way or the other as they’re yet to draw on their continental travels this season (W4, L2).
Key battle: Lazio may look to one of their big Serie A goal contributors Mattia Zaccagni (G8, A4) for an outlet, yet he was remarkably the recipient of a yellow card in five straight games during a sequence ending last month! Looking to stop him will be AZ Alkmaar full-back Milos Kerkez, who returns to Italy after a spell in AC Milan’s youth system. He had a hand in a third of AZ Alkmaar group stage goals (G1, A3).
Hot streak: Excluding qualifiers, AZ Alkmaar are winless across their last nine European knockout games (D3, L6), an ongoing negative club record.
