Serie A Betting Odds, Soccer Picks & Predictions for Matchday 2: Bets for Sassuolo-Leece & Atalanta-AC Milan

The Serie A season is heading into Matchday 2!

Find the Serie A betting picks and predictions OddsJam’s soccer expert @NorthSideCapper is locking in this weekend.

Serie A Matchday 2 Picks & Predictions

Sassuolo vs. Leece Pick: Over 2.75 | -130 at BetRivers

Saturday, August 20 | 2:45 p.m. ET

Neither squad has gotten off to a promising start. Both have already crashed out of the Coppa Italia — interestingly enough, both were on the wrong end of 3-2 score lines to Cittadella and Modena, respectively, and both lost their Matchday 1 fixtures.

Sassuolo entered the season off what was a poor ending to the 2021-22 Serie A campaign, having won only one match (3-1 over Bologna) in their last six to close out the season. That form — that didn’t carry into their exhibition matches where they were piling up positive results — did, unfortunately, carry over into this campaign.

Off a 3-0 loss to Juventus, Sassuolo will be searching for answers. Not that statistics tell the whole story, but they did out possess Juventus 58% to 42% and did compile 19 attempts at goal — seven of which hit the target but could not beat the keeper.

After ending the season with only six teams scoring more goals than Sassuolo, it will be interesting to see if they can regain that form fans have become accustomed to witnessing on a weekly basis.

Naturally, the loss of Gianluca Scamacca — who departed for West Ham United of the English Premier League — will hurt a bit, but Domenico Berardi should be able to help ease that loss. Berardi finished with 15 goals last season, just 1 behind Scamacca.

Leece, competing in their second season in the Serie A since 2012, suffered a heartbreaking defeat last Matchday at the hands of Inter Milan in a 2-1 loss. In the 95th minute, the Leece faithful were silenced by a Denzel Dumfries goal to give Serie A title favorites Inter Milan the 3 points.

While the defeat was unfortunate, there must be a sense of optimism within the room that they took a powerhouse squad right to the last minute of the match.

While Leece had a less than impressive road record last season, only securing two wins in their last 10 Serie B matches on their travels, they did manage to collect at least 1 goal in nine of those 10. Having scored in both of their competitive matches to start the year, there’s no reason given their history that form won’t follow them on the road this season and more specifically this Matchday.

In their two recent head-to-head encounters in Italy’s top division, we have seen scorelines of 4-2 and 2-2. Taking Leece’s ability to score on the road and a fragile Sassuolo defense who has simply outscored their opponents in seasons past, we should see goals and are rolling with the over 2.75 with confidence.

Atalanta vs. AC Milan Pick: AC Milan DNB | -122 at BetRivers

Sunday, August 21 | 2:45 p.m. ET

League Champions AC Milan travel to the Gewiss Stadium in Bergamo to take on Atalanta for the first time this season.

AC Milan are looking to defend their Serie A title and got the season off to a great start with a 4-2 win over Udinese last week. Milan’s quality in the final third has been extremely impressive, even dating back to their exhibition schedule where they managed to find the net 17 times in five matches.

That has transitioned well into the season as they buried 4 goals in front of their own fans, two on each side of halftime.

Milan aren’t the only ones who got off to a quick start. Atalanta also racked up the 3 points in their opening fixture with a 2-0 victory on the road at Sampdoria, but it wasn’t without a bit of a scare as they had believed to be 1-0 down in the 14th minute but VAR ruled out the opening goal due to a foul in the play.

Atalanta entered the season off a disappointing eight-place finish and look to fight for the top four, which is what we have come to expect of this squad over the last few seasons. If they are going to do that, they will require a change in fortune against AC Milan who they have struggled with over the last few seasons.

Atalanta have lost the last three matches to Milan, giving up two goals or more in all three of those matches. Things don’t get better when playing at home, over the last five head-to-head matches when Atalanta is listed as the home squad, Milan have lost a single time — credit to Atalanta, they have found the back of the net in four of those.

All things considered, reigning champions AC Milan off an impressive 4-goal display with history on their side should prove an extremely difficult task for this Atalanta side who have proven to be inconsistent in recent times. The DNB provides great value and at worse, we walk out of this with our stake returned to us.