Hello folks,

The penultimate season preview of Europe’s Big Five leagues deals with Serie A, which alas in recent years has become something of a forgotten league, a situation not helped by the recent poor showing of Italian sides in European club competition (a trend which, if unchecked this season, would see Serie A lose its fourth Champions League to the Bundesliga) and the dearth of Serie A coverage in the UK.

As one might expect, the main focus will be on Inter again this season, and not just because of Jose Mourinho’s soundbite fetish. The hoped-for challenge to Inter’s crown, after three seasons of domestic hegemony, never truly materialised last year, and it’s hard to envisage any side posing a true threat to Inter’s scudetto stranglehold this season, either. Despite the loss of Zlatan Ibrahimović to Barcelona, Inter’s squad, if anything, looks even stronger this season; Inter were paid handsomely for Ibra’s services (a good player, yes, but worth €60m?) and also received a two-time Champions League winner in the shape of Samuel Eto’o into the bargain (a man who is surely likely to inject a much-needed burst of pace and dynamism into the Inter attack, and make them much less prosaic and predictable in terms of their attacking play). Inter have also snapped up the two main protagonists of Genoa’s outstanding league showing last season, namely Argentine striker Diego Milito and rehabilitated holding midfielder Thiago Motta, as well as the exciting young Twente forward Marko Arnautović. If Inter can add a much needed creative link between the midfield and the attack (with Wesley Sneijder reportedly close to joining as part of Real Madrid’s summer fire sale), then not only will they be more than likely to scoop up yet another league title, but they might also be a lot more competitive in Europe.

In what is largely an unimpressive chasing pack, Juventus stand out as the one real challenger to Inter’s domestic supremacy. Perhaps the only club in Italy with anything like Inter’s Moratti-backed spending power, La Vecchia Signora have again invested wisely this summer, with Diego (Werder Bremen) being brought in as the side’s creative fulcrum in the absence of the now retired Pavel Nedvěd, while Felipe Melo (one of Fiorentina’s standout players from last season) as well as providing the kind of steel Christian Poulsen gave them last season, will also bring a sense of vision and passing ability that Poulsen evidently didn’t give them. If Amauri can continue to supply Juve with goals, and if new coach Ciro Ferrara is prepared to give wunderkind Sebastian Giovinco a proper run in the team (in a way that his predecessor Claudio Ranieri was not prepared to do last season) then Juventus, in spite of still being too reliant on the aging and increasingly heavy-legged Alex Del Piero, should have more than enough goal threat to challenge the nerazzurri. Where they may have problems, as last season, is in defence; Gigi Buffon, after being the world’s best goalkeeper for the best part of a decade, showed worrying signs of fallibility last season, and the retrograde re-acquisition of Fabio Cannavaro is surely going to backfire on them (last season’s dismal showing at Anfield last season is surely testament to that).

Elsewhere, Fiorentina are bound to miss Melo (last season’s deep-lying pivot), but have managed to retain most of their best players, not least star scorer Alberto Gilardino, now fully rehabilitated after a difficult spell at Milan. Cesare Prandelli remains arguably the brightest young manager in Italy at the moment, and if he can coax the best form out of Riccardo Montolivo (the young star of the team, but a man who didn’t push on last season in the way that many had hoped for), La Viola should be good value to claim the last of the remaining automatic Champions League qualification slots. Harder times may lie ahead for two of Serie A’s traditional giants, Milan and Roma, however; Milan will undoubtedly be hit extremely hard by the loss of Kaká, Serie A’s best player of the last few seasons. Replacing a player of that calibre would be difficult even if Silvio Berlusconi had been prepared to re-invest that money in the squad; what is arguably even more worrying for the rossoneri faithful is that Milan are still having to endure a period of financial belt-tightening, in which little of the money recouped from transfer sales makes its way to the transfer kitty.  So far, the only major move of the summer transfer window has been to bring in another of Real Madrid’s Dutch cast-offs, striker Klaas-Jan Huntelaar; while he is undoubtedly a fine finisher who will be well complimented by burgeoning young Brazilian talent Alexandre Pato, those two forwards will still need an adequate supply line, which in the absence of Kaká may be conspicuous by its absence. Andrea Pirlo, for so long the best deep-lying playmaker in the world (acclaimed by no less an authority than Johan Cruyff) is sadly now enduring a slow, steady decline, while it would be beyond the capabilities of even the most gifted man-manager to restore Ronaldinho’s form and motivation (not to mention his physique). The squad still contains far too many prominent members the wrong side of 30 (particularly in defence and midfield), and although attempts have been made to address the centre-back positions (Oguchi Onyewu and Thiago Silva have been brought in to replace the retiree Paolo Maldini and the perpetually injured Alex Nesta), Milan still look vulnerable in the full-back positions. Add to that a manager who will be making his debut season as a manager (ex-player Leonardo) and all the ingredients are there for a potentially disastrous season. My suspicion is that the experience in the squad will be just about enough for them to squeak a Champions League place, though they could be pushed extremely hard by a number of the chasing pack. 

Roma are unlikely to be as fortunate; the financial problems engulfing Italpetroli, the company owned by the Sensi family, continue to afflict Roma, who were this summer forced to sell one of their key players, midfielder Alberto Aquilani, to Liverpool; some commentators have snarkily pointed to Aquilani’s admittedly poor injury record as a reason why he is unlikely to be missed, yet that fails to disguise the fact that the sale of Aquilani has shorn Roma’s midfield of one of the few players capable of scoring goals from that position. Even Daniele De Rossi, the Steven Gerrard-type figure at the heart of Roma’s midfield, rarely contributes much in terms of goals. That will mean that a heavy goalscoring burden will again be placed on Mirko Vucinić and veteran talisman Francesco Totti, who Roma still remain pitifully dependent on. The defence remains strong, with Philippe Mexès and Juan still in place & Marco Motta now permanently signed from Udinese after an impressive loan spell, but it’s hard to imagine Roma having the creativity needed to really push for a top four finish (Luciano Spalletti remains mystifyingly loyal to the declining David Pizarro, while the insipid form of Jérémy Menez last season highlights how much Amantino Mancini is still missed). Genoa, too, are likely to struggle to repeat last season’s heroics, losing two of their key players, Milito and Motta, to Inter and receiving only the fading Hernán Crespo and a few magic beans in return. While the signings of Marco Amelia and Rodrigo Palacio both look astute, a Europa League place is likely to be the height of their ambitions this season. A more credible challenge for a Champions League spot may instead come from Napoli, in spite of  their woeful showing in the second half of last season. A number of exciting purchases have been made this summer, the main one among them being the signing of national team forward and prodigal son Fabio Quagliarella (another step towards De Laurentiis’ dream of a “team of Neapolitans.”) Less high profile, but no less impressive, were the acquisitions of Luca Cigarini (a future Nazionale central midfielder in the making), goalkeeper Morgan De Sanctis, and defender Juan Zuniga from Siena (one of the reasons why the Robur were so hard to break down last year, especially at home). If Donadoni can successfully make the transition from the ill-advised 3-5-2 formation of his predecessor Edy Reja (surely 3-5-2 is an anachronism in modern football) to a more conventional 4-4-2, and if he can get Marek Hamšik, Ezequiel Lavezzi and Christian Maggio to perform as they did in the first half of last season, Napoli could yet force Milan into the ignominy of a Europa League place. My suspicion, however, is that Napoli will pick up too few points on the road to realise that ambition.

Of the remaining likely Europa League contenders, Lazio have a squad that remains paper-thin, with the likes of Lorenzo De Silvestri, Goran Pandev and Cristián Ledesma all angling for moves, while the attack is worryingly dependent on the admittedly excellent (yet strangely uncoveted) striker Mauro Zárate, and another season of mid-table mediocrity surely awaits. The same fate may also befall Udinese; although they have retained the services of Gaetano D’Agostino (Andrea Pirlo’s heir apparent) in the face of strong interest from Juventus, the loss of Quagliarella from the attack may prove an insurmountable loss for the Zebrette. By contrast, Palermo (with new coach Walter Zenga on board and with exciting young Argentine midfielder Javier Pastore acquired from Huracán) and Sampdoria (who have retained the services of goalscoring “twins” Antonio Cassano and Giampaolo Pazzini, and have made an intelligent managerial appointment in the form of Gigi Del Neri) may be decent outside bets for a European slot.

In terms of the relegation battle, it’s likely to be a familiar tale of last season’s strugglers and all of the promoted teams from Serie B battling against the drop. Of the three promoted sides, Parma look the best placed to survive in Serie A, having made some smart acquisitions in the summer transfer window (notably bringing in goalkeeper Antonio Mirante from Samp, and exciting young midfielder Daniele Galloppa from Siena). Livorno, by contrast, were somewhat fortunate to scrape promotion via the play-offs, and given that their summer reinforcements have been largely limited to re-signing old boys such as Cristiano Lucarelli and Dario Knežević, they could well end up being cut adrift at the foot of the table. Of the other likely strugglers, Chievo were only spared relegation last season thanks to the fillip received by a mid-season change of coach, and with a squad that is arguably weaker than last season’s, it’s hard to imagine them repeating that feat. Bologna’s squad remains small but the goals of Marco Di Vaio should enable them to survive for another season in Serie A; meanwhile, Bari have endured a turbulent summer on their return to the top flight after nine years as Serie B champions (having lost talented young coach Antonio Conte, who was replaced by Giampiero Ventura), but the intriguing arrival of American Timothy Barton as chairman may enable the Southern side to make the signings needed to consolidate in Serie A. That means one of Catania or Siena is likely to occupy the third relegation slot; this column’s tip would be Siena, who have lost three of their key players (Houssine Kharja to Genoa, Daniele Galloppa to Parma, and Juan Zuniga to Napoli) over the summer, and while some interesting youngsters have arrived at the Tuscan club (among them Michele Paolucci and Aleandro Rosi), it’s doubtful that the Robur will have the necessary firepower to stay up.

Well that’s all for another week, folks. I will hopefully have my La Liga preview (the last in the series) posted some time during the course of the coming week; in the meantime, for your amusement, here are my predictions:

● Champions: Inter (still too strong for the rest of the field in Serie A, and possibly a force to be reckoned with in Europe too, if Sneijder arrives).

● Runners-up: Juventus (remain Inter’s biggest threat, and have bought well - especially Diego - but the defence remains a liability, and re-signing Cannavaro was a mistake).

● Third-place (and automatic Champions League qualification slot): Fiorentina (losing Felipe Melo was a big blow, but with Gila’s goals La Viola should take advantage of Milan and Roma’s lingering deficiencies).

● Fourth place (and Champions league qualification slot): Milan (but only just; big problems remain at Milanello).

● Europa League slots: Napoli, Roma, Sampdoria (the latter dependent on cup results).

● Relegation slots: Siena, Chievo, Livorno (in descending order; expect Livorno to be all but doomed by the Christmas intermission).