Fiorentina vs AC Milan: Emotions until the end

Fiorentina host AC Milan at the Stadio Artemio Franchi on Saturday evening (19:45) with the visitors still trying to find a way to catch rivals Inter Milan in the title race, despite having 14 points to make up.

Matches between La Viola and the Rossoneri are rarely dull affairs but this one on Saturday is going to be extra charged with emotions. Here are our Fiorentina vs AC Milan predictions which include match odds and team news.

In fact Fiorentina will remember their late General Manager, Joe Barone, who sadly passed away on 19th March. Barone worked at the club since 2019 and during his very successful spell Fiorentina played two cup finals and inaugurated a new state-of-the-art training centre, Viola Park, last October.  

The hosts are the only Italian side, with Atalanta, still involved in three competitions and in June will part company with their manager, Vincenzo Italiano, who’s looking for a new challenge after three campaigns in Tuscany.  

Fiorentina have plenty of reasons to give it all to finish the season on a high, but they’ll face a side, AC Milan, who are in a very fine form. In fact in the last 11 game, Stefano Pioli’s men have almost kept the same peace as Inter.  

They achieved 26 points (four less than the leaders), lost just one game in Serie A (4-2 to Monza) and scored, on average, 2.09 goals per game. 

The visitors have just one point less in the table compared to the 2021/2022 season, when they were crowned champions, and have scored the same number of goals (55).  

AC Milan had a blip in October-November, when they collected just two points out of four games, but since their win 1-0 against Fiorentina in Matchday 13, their season has been really good. 

Perhaps AC Milan consistency has been overshadowed by their city rivals’ achievements and the fact that the Rossoneri have been defeated in the last five derbies.  

Fiorentina have two more points (with a game in hand) compared to last year but have already lost three times at the Artemio Franchi where in 2022/2023 they suffered four domestic defeats.  

Their high-press and high-line football often produces goals (they’ve only failed to score four times at home in all competitions this season), but has cost them in big games.  

Italiano’s men haven’t kept a clean sheet in any of the five domestic big matches they played this campaign, although they have scored two goals, and picked up seven points, against Bologna, Lazio and Roma. 

Team News 

Giacomo Bonaventura (a former AC Milan player who scored 30 goals in six seasons with the Rossoneri) and Theo Hernandez are both suspended. January signing Andrea Belotti (one goal so far for Fiorentina) will play up front with Lucas Beltran (three goals in the last eight matches) for hosts. Riccardo Sottil and Nico Gonzalez will complete the forward line. 

In defence, Italy’s Under 21 right-back Michael Kayode should play instead of Davide Faraoni and Martinez Quarta is ahead of Luca Ranieri (the top scorer among Italian defenders with five goals this season) to form the centre-back pairing with Milenkovic. 

In the visitors’ camp Alesandro Florenzi will be the left-back whereas Pierre Kalulu and Tomasso Pobega are not available due to injuries. Ismael Bennacer will retain his place in midfield and Malick Thiaw should play in the centre of the defence with Fikayo Tomori. Ruben Loftus-Cheek, RafaelLeao and Christian Pulisic will support Olivier Giroud. 

Match Odds 

A tough game to predict based on the high odds, with AC Milan only slightly favourite (8/5) over the hosts (7/4) to get the three points.  

Stefano Pioli’s men have won win nine Serie A away games (11 in all competitions), including against top sides such as Bologna (2-0), Lazio (1-0), Roma (2-1) and Newcastle United (3-1).  

Fiorentina have only lost one (1-0 vs Inter) of their last 12 home matches in all competitions and have won the last two games against the Rossoneri at the ‘Artemio Franchi’.  

La Viola haven’t registered three consecutive home successes against AC Milan since the seasons 1972 to 1974.  

The draw pays at 23/10, however these two sides have shared the points only once in the last 12 matches, with the visitors recording seven wins.  

Fiorentina have drawn three of their last four league games, including the past two (against Torino and Roma) and the last time they drew three games in a row was between February and June 2020.  

There’s good value on both the Over 2.5 Goals (10/11) and the Under 2.5 (4/5) markets: in fact fourteen out of 29 AC Milan games (48%, the highest percentage in Serie A) have produced at least four goals. 

Four of the last six games between these two sides ended with both teams on the scoresheet and at least three goals.  

Over 2.5 Goals @ 10/11 

In 2024 AC Milan are, alongside Inter, the team who scored most goals (15) and collected more points on the road (15 in six games, whereas Inter have played five).  

The Rossoneri are sharing another record with their ‘cousins’ as they’re the only sides that have always found the net on their travels.  

However AC Milan defensive record away from San Siro has been rather poor, also due to the many injuries that affected them in the past Autumn.  

They have conceded 25 goals (fifth-worst defence) and kept only four clean sheets. 

Highest Scoring Half: Second @ 21/20 

The Rossoneri hold the Serie A record for most away games where both teams have scored (73%), and 10 Fiorentina’s home encounters, including the cup competitions, have produced the same outcome. 

Fourteen league goals this season have been scored by AC Milan players who came off the bench, an all time record for the Rossoneri.  

But Fiorentina are not short of goalscorers either as 16 different players have already contributed to their season’s total of 64.  

Last season La Viola were also one of Europe’s top scoring sides, with 98 goals in total, 17 of which in Serie A were netted by substitutes.  

Eight of the last nine Fiorentina’s home games have registered at least one goal in the second half and in 11 AC Milan away games there have been goals after the 75th minute, which is a record for the season in Italy’s top flight.