After falling to Milan, Lazio suffered their second defeat in a row in Europa League as Galatasaray topped them one-nil thanks to a shocking blunder by Thomas Strakosha, who was filling in for the day. The Biancocelesti never managed to kick it into high gear and created very few chances. That did not change after going down in the score.
As anticipated, Maurizio Sarri did not change the XI too much. Sergej Milinkovic-Savic and Pedro initially got a breather, but not Ciro Immobile, Luis Alberto, Francesco Acerbi, and Lucas Leiva. Mattia Zaccagni made his first start since joining Lazio, while Jean-Daniel Akpa Akpro relieved the Serbian star.
Lazio had problems controlling the game and never really imposed their will, as Galatasaray held the ball a lot too. The first half was rather uneventful. Fernando Muslera was booked a few minutes into the game for mistiming his tackle coming out aggressively on Manuel Lazzari. Olimpiu Morutan had the biggest opportunity out of the blue, firing a piledriver from distance that rattled the crossbar. Immobile had a penalty claim in the final minutes, but the referee opted for a no-call.
The second half was not much different despite all the substitutions. However, Lazio had a self-inflicted error that cost them the game. Strakosha misread the trajectory of the ball and his positioning on a sky-high backward clearance by Lazzari, he could not corral it, and it ricocheted off the woodwork and across the line. The Biancocelesti’s reactions stopped at a deep channel run by Milinkovic-Savic, but the midfielder failed to correctly loft it over Muslera.