Roma v Lazio: Will resurgent Claudio Ranieri or buoyant Marco Baroni claim the Rome derby spoils in Serie A encounter?
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Updated 05/01/2025 at 09:43 GMT
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All eyes will be on the Stadio Olimpico in Rome on Sunday night when one of European football's fiercest rivalries is staged for the first time this season. Roma face Lazio in the Rome derby with a lot at stake after wildly contrasting seasons for the two clubs so far. The Rome derby is live on TNT Sports and discovery+ on Sunday, January 5 at 19:45 UK time.
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The first weekend of 2025 got off to a peaceful start in Rome. A sparkling sun hung in a pastel-blue sky, soaking Romans in warm rays ahead of a long Epiphany weekend.
But when darkness falls on Sunday, an altogether different atmosphere will consume the ancient capital of Italy.
Nothing brings an air of twitching nervousness to the streets of the Eternal City like the Derby della Capitale, and nothing provides such extremes of joy and despair to the followers of Lazio and Roma.
This season, those fans have been made to wait as long as the season will allow to face their rivals, with Sunday night’s clash at the Stadio Olimpico – live on TNT Sports and discovery+ – marking the pivot point before the second half of the campaign starts.
No wonder the build-up has been frenetic. Both clubs opened the doors of their training grounds this week to allow thousands of fans the chance to flood in and not-so-gently remind the players of the importance of this fixture.
Lazio’s new coach Marco Baroni will step into the Capitale cauldron for the first time against an opposing coach, the vastly experienced Claudio Ranieri, who understands this fixture as well as anyone.
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The timing of the game makes it fascinating. Lazio are flying high under Baroni but face a Roma side hinting at a Ranieri-led resurgence, that has matched their rivals' results in the last five games. It is tantalisingly balanced.
Baroni brings good vibes back to Lazio
In a season of surprises in Serie A, Lazio’s bid for UEFA Champions League qualification - or even to insert themselves into the Scudetto debate - is right up there as one of the biggest.
A disruptive 2023/24 season saw Maurizio Sarri quit and his successor, Igor Tudor, last just three months in post as Lazio finished seventh, followed by the summer exits of a trio who were fundamental in recent years: Luis Alberto, Felipe Anderson and all-time top scorer Ciro Immobile.
The appointment of Baroni, a 61-year-old journeyman with no ‘big job' experience who got the gig on the back of leading Hellas Verona to survival, was met with an unenthusiastic response, while the summer signings were widely viewed as lacking in ambition too. The mood was sour when the season kicked off, with protests against club owner Claudio Lotito dominating the opening-day chants.
Now, the atmosphere could not be more different. Baroni has been a sensation, not only leading Lazio into the top four in Serie A, just six points off the top, but also to the top of the UEFA Europa League standings and into the Coppa Italia quarter-finals.
His aggressive, attacking style of football has put smiles not only on the faces of the fans, but also the players, who are brimming with confidence and loving life under a boss who has proven himself adept at rotating the squad amid a hectic schedule, with 15 different players finding the net this season so far for the Biancocelesti.
Striker Taty Castellanos has led the way with seven goals, but second-top scorer Pedro will miss the chance to face his former club and continue his late-career surge in form through injury.
Nuno Tavares made a barnstorming start to life in Italy after joining from Arsenal in the summer, producing eight assists in his first eight games, and eyes will be on the newly capped Portugal international to get back to his best on the biggest stage on Sunday after a recent dip in form.
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"You live for these games," Baroni said ahead of the match. But the Lazio coach came with a warning, too.
"We are playing this game on Sunday, not two months ago," he added.
"In the last five games, the teams have earned the same number of points. Since Ranieri came to Roma they have scored twice as many goals. It will be a balanced, dangerous game, and it’s even better for that."
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Ranieri returning Roma stability
While Baroni will be breaking new ground in his career-first Rome derby, this is familiar territory for Ranieri. But that is not to say the wily veteran was expecting to be here.
In November, Ranieri was drafted in to douse the flames of the hot tempers surrounding the club following a disastrous start to the season.
The decision to sack club legend Daniele De Rossi just four games into the season, after handing him a long-term contract in the summer, led to the fans turning against Roma’s American owners, the Friedkin Group.
His successor Ivan Juric had the unenviable task of calming the waters and was not up to it, resulting in his sacking in November and Ranieri’s decision to come out of retirement to lead his boyhood club for a third time in their moment of need.
After a tricky start, Ranieri managed to bring a degree of optimism back in a productive December, when Roma won four of their six games and finished strongly by scoring 10 goals in their last three, beating Sampdoria 4-1 in the Coppa Italia before thrashing Parma 5-0 and taking a 1-1 draw against AC Milan at San Siro.
There is still a mountain of work to be done if the former Leicester City manager is to make something of this season, a truth made painfully clear to Romanisti by the fact they trail Lazio by a combined 22 points between Serie A and the Europa League.
In the league, Roma are 15 points behind their rivals - and their target of a top-four finish - in 10th place, while in the Europa League they sit in 14th, seven points behind their table-topping neighbours and in danger of missing out on an automatic last-16 spot with two games to go.
But the green shoots of December suggest they can take the fight to their rivals on Sunday, as does the fact they will be the ‘home’ team with three-quarters of the stadium behind them.
Plus, Ranieri’s four previous derbies as coach all ended in wins for the Giallorossi, and the latest meeting went their way in April when Gianluca Mancini’s goal decided a tight affair and ended a four-game winless run for Roma in the fixture.
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Perhaps most important of all is that the physically fragile but precociously talented Paulo Dybala has hit a rich vein of form since rumours of a transfer resurfaced.
His confidence was best demonstrated by a sumptuously taken volley off his ‘weaker’ right foot against Milan, the Argentina international World Cup winner’s third goal in the last two games following a brace and assist against Parma.
He seems to take this game personally, too. Over the course of his career, Dybala has scored 11 goals against Lazio, second only to Udinese (14) in his list of Serie A victims.
"Lazio are having a stratospheric season, they are playing with auto-pilot on," Ranieri said.
"But this match makes its own history. The league table doesn’t count. For me, and I am also a fan, winning would have enormous value."
How to watch Roma v Lazio live on TNT Sports and discovery+
Two Serie A matches per matchday week will be broadcast on TNT Sports, from the 2024/25 season until 2026/27.
Roma v Lazio kicks off at 19:45 UK time on Sunday, January 5. It will be shown live on TNT Sports 1 and discovery+.
Stream the 2024-25 Serie A season live on TNT Sports and discovery+
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AS Roma
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SS Lazio
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