A historic irony precedes the Juventus and Lazio clash: Gattuso searches for an exceptional record
Are the balances of power changing?
Juventus are preparing to face Lazio tomorrow, Sunday, in the seventh round of Serie A, and the numbers behind it make for striking reading. None more so than the points gap between the two sides.
Opta's statisticians have found something unprecedented. Juventus, on 11 points, meet Lazio, who have 16, in a first-half-of-the-season fixture with the Bianconeri at least five points behind their opponents for the first time in Serie A history.
Perfect balance has defined the last nine Serie A meetings between the pair: three wins each and three draws. Before that, Juventus won 12 of the previous 15 encounters in the competition, drawing one and losing two.
No side has beaten Lazio more often in Serie A history than Juventus, whose record reads 87 victories, 40 draws and 37 defeats. They have also put 290 goals past them in the competition, at least 18 more than any other team.
Thirteen consecutive home matches against Lazio in Serie A have brought a Juventus goal, 30 in total, an average of 2.3 per game. Their only longer home scoring run against the Biancocelesti came during the first 21 overall meetings between the two sides in the competition at the Allianz Stadium.
Three wins, two draws and one defeat have given Juventus 11 points from their first six Serie A matches this season.
Over the last ten seasons, the side have failed to exceed that tally after their first seven matches in the competition on only two occasions, gathering 11 points in 2021-2022 and 10 points in 2022-2023.
Lazio, on the other hand, are yet to lose in Serie A this season, having recorded five wins and one draw.
Only six times in their history have the side avoided defeat in their first seven Serie A matches of a season, but they never won six of them, registering five wins and two draws in both 1972-1973 and 1999-2000, the season that brought their most recent league title.
Sixteen points from six rounds leaves Lazio as one of two sides with the most points in Serie A this season, level with Inter Milan.
The last time Lazio began a league round, having played more than five matches in the competition, without trailing the leaders was in the 2010-2011 season, when they sat alone at the top before the start of the eleventh round.
History beckons for Gennaro Gattuso, who could become the first coach to record six wins in his first seven matches in charge of Lazio in the competition, having claimed five wins and one draw so far.
Igor Tudor, Tommaso Maestrelli and Vladimir Petkovic have each previously managed five wins in their first seven matches with the side.
Juventus forward Randal Kolo Muani has been involved in two goals in his last three league matches, scoring one and assisting another, having previously netted against Lazio in the competition on 10 May 2025.
That tally matches his total goal contributions across his previous 33 matches in Europe's five major leagues.
Having scored against Cagliari in the last match, the French striker can now find the net in two consecutive games in these competitions for the first time since the period between January and February 2025, when he scored in his first three appearances for Juventus, netting against Napoli and a brace against both Empoli and Como.
Tijjani Noslin's first goals in Serie A came against Juventus on 17 February 2024, when he was a Hellas Verona player, in a match that ended 2-2. The Dutch striker is enjoying his best season in terms of goal contributions per minute played in Europe's ten major leagues, having scored two goals and provided two assists in his last three matches, at a rate of one goal contribution every 65 minutes.
Among players who have scored or assisted at least three goals in this season's Serie A, only Edon Zhegrova, with one contribution every 39 minutes, and Marcus Thuram, with one every 58 minutes, better Noslin's rate of goal contributions.
