This is the battle of the seconds, Juventus second from top, and SPAL second from bottom. Both need wins for very different reasons, although SPAL will not be overly hopeful of taking three points away from the Juventus Stadium.
Juventus beat SPAL 2-0 in this fixture last season but perhaps the visitors will take some hope from their 2-1 victory against the eventual champions when they last met.
SPAL just happened to be the team Juventus visited between their two-legged Champions League quarter-final against Ajax. On that day, Massimiliano Allegri decided to rest most of his first-team for the midweek tie and ended up losing 2-1 to SPAL.
As they come face-to-face once again, the Old Lady will hope to dispatch them with ease, but given their issues at the back, SPAL will sense an opportunity. It'll still be a long shot, but it may be the spark they need to really trouble the defending champions.
Juventus' defensives woes
The defending champions have conceded 5 goals in 5 games so far. Three of those came in a 7-goal thriller at Napoli earlier in the season, which makes it look far worse than it is.
Nonetheless, having lost Girogio Chiellini to an ACL injury, Leonardo Bonucci and Matthijs de Ligt have looked far from a sturdy partnership and even Merih Demiral has shown that he's prone to a mistake or two.
To top their inconsistency at the back, they go into this weekend with none of their regular full-backs available to them. While Mattia Di Sciglio and Danilo are recovering from injuries, Alex Sandro has returned to Brazil following the sudden passing away of his father.
Maurizio Sarri has to address the full-back issue in a hurry if Juventus are to start stamping their authority on the Serie A. Although they may still go on to win comfortably against SPAL, the visitors have shown a capability to score goals and the Bianconeri should be wary.
Score Prediction: Juventus 3-1 SPAL
