AC Milan vs Lecce Prediction: Visitors can break out of barren run in front of goal

After four-straight wins in Serie A, AC Milan are starting to open up a gap in second place. I Rossoneri are now six points ahead of nearest challengers Juventus and with the Turin club not playing until Sunday evening, there is the chance to widen that gap with a victory over Lecce at San Siro on Saturday (KO, 14:00).

The visitors can't match the form of their upcoming opponents but they have managed to pick up four points from their last two games, the most recent of which saw them register 27 shots in a goalless draw with Roma. Below is our AC Milan vs Lecce prediction ahead of this clash between two sides separated by 36 points in the table.

The gap in places and points may be considerable but there was little to separate the sides back in November when they played out a 2-2 draw at Stadio Via del Mare.

Milan were leading by two goals at half-time courtesy of first-half strikes from Olivier Giroud and Tijjani Reijnders, but Lecce hit back in the second period through Nicola Sansone and Lameck Banda.

Saturday's hosts now look to be all-but assured of Champions League qualification, with the only real objective remaining to ensure they finish second ahead of Juventus and Bologna.

Lecce, meanwhile, are still battling to preserve their league status. I Giallorossi are in 13th but are only four points ahead of 18th-placed Empoli and five in front of Sassuolo in 19th, so there is still work to be done for head coach Luca Gotti and his charges.

Team News

Milan have a Europa League quarter-final first-leg fixture with AS Roma at San Siro on Thursday, so it remains to be seen whether Stefano Pioli opts to rest some players ahead of that tie.

Rafael Leao, Olivier Giroud and Theo Hernandez are a few of their main men and could be held back for midweek, but there are four whole rest days between the games so the need to hold players back is less pressing.

One player certain to miss Saturday's contest, though, is Ruben Loftus-Cheek, who must serve a one-match ban for an accumulation of yellow cards in Serie A. Yunus Musah and Yacine Adli are options to replace the Englishman in midfield; the former was a second-half substitute in last Saturday's 2-1 win at Fiorentina, where Loftus-Cheek and Leao scored either side of I Viola's Alfred Duncan.

Meanwhile, Pierre Kalulu and Tommaso Pobega will both miss out again through injury, and Hernandez is likely to replace Alessandro Florenzi at left-back after being suspended for last weekend's trip to Florence. Veteran defender Simon Kjaer could also return to the squad after recovering from an issue.

The visitors will have to make do without midfielder Mohamed Kaba for a fourth consecutive game due to injury, and there are decisions to be made in attack after the likes of Nikola Krstovic and Roberto Piccoli failed to fire on Monday.

Lecce's scorers against Milan in November - Banda and Sansone - both came off the bench against Roma and will be pushing for starts on Saturday, while Remi Oudin is another who could come into Gotti's thinking.

Match Odds

Milan can be backed at 1/3, giving them an implied win probability of 75%, while Lecce are rank outsiders at 8/1, which gives them an 11.1% chance of victory.

The draw is available at 4/1, both teams to score is EVS and over 2.5 goals can be found at 8/11.

Both teams to score - Yes @ EVS

This may be an intriguing selection given Lecce are among the lowest scorers in Serie A - only Empoli (22) and Salernitana (23) have struck fewer than their tally of 26 - and the fact that none of their 27 shots on Monday found the net.

They've now failed to score in three of their last five and their only goal in the last three has come from an opposing player, Salernitana's Norbert Gyomber, whose own-goal gave them a 1-0 win - not really selling this am I?

However, surely the dam has to burst soon for Lecce, who have registered 84 shots across their last five games.

Their next opponents, meanwhile, haven't exactly been watertight at the back. In 18 games since the turn of the year, Milan have managed to keep just five clean sheets in all competitions, and just two in their last nine.

The Milan backline was breached on two occasions by Lecce in the reverse fixture, and they also conceded twice to them in one of their head-to-heads last season.

With one eye possibly on Thursday's Europa League tie with Roma, Milan may just allow some complacency to creep in, and Lecce can take advantage in their bid to avoid the drop.

It would certainly be a surprise if the hosts don't score, though - they've scored in 15 consecutives games at San Siro, last being shut out there by Udinese on November 4.

#PickYourPunt - Over 39.5 booking points & Lecce over 11.5 shots @ 15/8

As previously mentioned, Lecce's shot count has been through the roof over the past month or so. The above selection requires them to fire off at least 12 shots, something they have done in four of their last five games, which includes one against runaway leaders Inter.

The only occasion in that run where they failed to reach the 12-shot mark? Away to Frosinone on March 3, when they narrowly missed it by registering 11 attempts.

Lecce's game average for the season is 13.7 shots per game, ranking them sixth in that metric.

Milan, meanwhile, conceded 17 shots away to Fiorentina last weekend, and allowed Verona to have 15 in their previous match.

On to the second part of this suggestion, which is all about booking points. These sides both rank highly for yellow cards this season - only Roma (75) have accrued more than Lecce (73), while Milan are in eighth on 66. That means Lecce average 2.4 yellow cards per game in Serie A, and Milan average 2.2, and that's without taking red cards into account.

Yellow cards are worth 10 booking points with Betfred, meaning that if these two clubs hit their average per game, we're looking at a minimum of 40 booking points, enough to land this selection.

It was a scrappy affair earlier this season with a whopping 115 booking points awarded. Lecce racked up 40 via four yellow cards while Milan's 75 came from four yellows and one dismissal for Giroud (if a referee books a player but later sends him off, even if it is for two yellow cards offences, it will total 35 booking points for the purposes of the bet - one yellow & one red card).

Check out the rest of our Football Betting Tips here.