Napoli vs Barça: Preview

Photo by Matthew Ashton - AMA/Getty Images

The first of two games in the United States will give Barça a big test just 10 days away from their league debut

SSC Napoli vs FC Barcelona

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Competition/Round: 2019 Preseason, United States Tour, Match 1

Barcelona Outs & Doubts: Lionel Messi (out)

Napoli Outs & Doubts: Piotr Zielinski (doubt)

Date/Time: Wednesday, August 7, 2019, 1.30am CET (Barcelona, Thursday), 12.30am BST/WAT (UK & Nigeria, Thursday), 7.30pm ET, 4.30pm PT (USA), 5am IST (India, Thursday)

Venue: Hard Rock Stadium, Miami, USA

How to watch on TV: Premier Sports 1 (UK), TV3 (Spain), others

How to stream: ESPN+ (USA), Premier Player (UK), others

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Barcelona are in the United States for a quick, week-long tour of America for two friendlies against Napoli. The first game takes place in Miami, and this promises to be a really fun night of football in America.

Without the injured Lionel Messi there will be opportunities for other players to show their worth in attack, as well as the chance to watch the trio of Ousmane Dembélé, Antoine Griezmann and Luis Suárez play together for the first time.

Napoli have had a good preseason with dominant wins over Liverpool and Olympique Marseille in their last two games, and Carlo Ancelotti is looking forward to facing Barça twice to find out where his team is in terms of preparation for the new Italian season.

Once again the result doesn’t matter in preseason, but the start of La Liga is just 10 days away so the performance has to be good enough to inspire some confidence. This should be fun.

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POSSIBLE LINEUPS

Barcelona (4-3-3): Ter Stegen; Semedo, Piqué, Umtiti, Alba; Rakitic, De Jong, Riqui Puig; Dembélé, Suárez, Griezmann

Napoli (4-4-2): Meret; Hysaj, Manolas, Maksimovic, Mário Rui; Callejón, Fabián, Zielinski, Insigne; Mertens, Milik

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PREDICTION

It’s preseason so who cares, but there will be a lot of goals: 2-2 draw.

Source: barcablaugranes.com