Stefan de Vrij has reportedly shaken off a fever in time to start for Lazio in tonight’s Champions League play-off with Bayer Leverkusen.
It kicks off at the Stadio Olimpico at 19.45 UK time (18.45 GMT) and is the first leg of this showdown.
Check back from 18.40 UK time (17.40 GMT) for our LIVEBLOG.
The winners will enter the tournament proper, the losers are re-routed into the Europa League and lose a huge payday purely by not participating in the group phase.
Stefan de Vrij has reportedly shaken off a fever in time to start for Lazio in tonight’s Champions League play-off with Bayer Leverkusen.
It kicks off at the Stadio Olimpico at 19.45 UK time (18.45 GMT) and is the first leg of this showdown.
Check back from 18.40 UK time (17.40 GMT) for our LIVEBLOG.
The winners will enter the tournament proper, the losers are re-routed into the Europa League and lose a huge payday purely by not participating in the group phase.
According to the latest reports from Rome, defender De Vrij has been able to recover sufficiently from a fever to be in the starting XI.
Coach Stefano Pioli sticks with his favoured 4-3-3 formation, despite the problems suffered with a series of pre-season defeats.
Nigeria international Ogenyi ‘Eddy’ Onazi is expected to start with Lucas Biglia and Marco Parolo, preferred to Danilo Cataldi and summer signing Sergej Milinkovic-Savic.
Etrit Berisha is in goal following an injury to Federico Marchetti.
Filip Djordjevic, Edson Braafheid and suspended Stefan Radu are also ruled out this evening.
Bayer Leverkusen miss Toprak and former Roma defender Tin Jedvaj.
The referee is Swede Jonas Eriksson.
Probable line-ups
Lazio: Berisha; Basta, De Vrij, Gentiletti, Lulic; Onazi, Biglia, Parolo; Candreva, Klose, Felipe Anderson
Lazio bench: Guerrieri, Hoedt, Konko, Patric, Mauricio, Cataldi, Milinkovic-Savic, Morrison, Oikonomidis, Keita, Kishna
Bayer Leverkusen: Leno; Hilbert, Papadopoulos, Tah, Wendell; Kramer, Bender; Bellarabi, Çalhanoğlu, Son; Kiessling. All. Schmidt
Leverkusen bench: Kresic, Yelldell, Stayfilidis, Boenisch, Donati, Ramalho, Kruse, Brandt, Jurcenko, Aranguiz, Mehmedi, Seung-Woo