Gianluca Scamacca is favourite over Giacomo Raspadori in attack, while Matteo Politano is expected to replace Domenico Berardi as Italy’s right winger against Ukraine.
It kicks off at 19:45 GMT at the BayArena in Leverkusen.
A draw is enough for the Azzurri to qualify for Euro 2024, while a defeat would force Luciano Spalletti’s men to go through qualification play-offs to earn a spot for te European Championships next year.
Spalletti will make a few changes to Italy’s starting XI following Friday’s 5-2 win over North Macedonia. The CT will likely swap Federico Gatti with Gianluca Mancini in central defence, replace Matteo Darmian with Giovanni Di Lorenzo and Giacomo Bonaventura with Davide Frattesi.
Politano is expected to start as a right winger in place of Domenico Berardi, while Scamacca is favourite over Raspadori in attack. Federico Chiesa, scorer of two goals against North Macedonia, will be confirmed on the left wing.
Scamacca scored his first Italy goal during the previous international break, giving the Azzurri the lead against England at Wembley Stadium in an eventual 3-1 loss.
Italy-Ukraine, probable line-ups
Ukraine (4-2-3-1): Trubin; Mikolenko, Matvienko, Zabarnyl, Tymchyk; Stepanenko, Zinchenko; Tsygankov, Sudakov, Mudryk; Dovbyk.
Italy (4-3-3): Donnarumma; Di Lorenzo, Mancini, Acerbi, Dimarco; Frattesi, Jorginho, Barella; Politano, Scamacca, Chiesa.
Politano over Berardi sounds pretty good.
I always found Berardi pretty average to be honest, he’s one of those okay players which won’t make the difference by himself.
agreed… he’s inconsistent. He has put in some good performances but many average ones too.. I think his work rate is subpar. If he worked hard he would have been a better players all these years..