Ahead of the new Italian Serie A season, former AC Milan and Lazio coach Alberto Zaccheroni gave Reuters his analysis of the five main challengers for the 'scudetto'.

Zaccheroni won the Serie A title with Milan in 1999 after coming to attention as coach of Udinese, whom he took to a best ever third-place in 1998. After leaving Milan he was coach of Lazio during the 2001-02 season.

JUVENTUS

They have strengthened the squad in all areas, above all by bringing in Nicola Legrottaglie in defence, Stephen Appiah in midfield and Fabrizio Miccoli in attack.

In particular, I would single out Appiah who is an outstanding player of great promise. I know him very well having given him his debut as a teenager with Udinese during the season when we finished third in the league.

Clearly Juve are going to be up there -- it could just be a question of one point more or less which will decide whether they finish first or second. The club is very well organised and the coach needs only to deal with the technical issues. There is high quality throughout the squad.

I agree with those who say that if there is one thing missing it is an alternative to David Trezeguet in attack. They have Marco Di Vaio as another striker but he is more cover for Alessandro Del Piero and Miccoli is an alternative to Del Piero or Mauro Camoranesi on the right wing.

They don't have another forward with the physical presence of Trezeguet and if they were to lose him they would have to change their system. But they were without Trezeguet last season for a good spell and (coach Marcello) Lippi showed that he is well capable of adapting the side to cope with that.

Lippi says that this is his strongest ever Juventus side and I agree they are certainly stronger than the last two seasons.

AC MILAN

From a technical point of view they have the strongest squad. Looking at last season, it was clear that they expressed themselves the best in the crunch games, against the likes of Real Madrid and Bayern Munich in Europe. But in the league they left something to be desired when playing against teams such as Bologna and Empoli and that is a problem for them.

The other problem is that they don't put in enough shots on target -- it is a question for the midfield who look for that final pass. There are a lot of options in the squad though and the club is very well organised.

In attack, they have Filippo Inzaghi and Andriy Shevchenko who are great when Milan have the ball but not so good when they don't. However, Milan's midfield and defence are so strong that they can cope with that.

The two strikers are both players capable of guaranteeing you 20 goals a season and when you have that it is going to be hard not to win. With the victory in the Champions League last season they will have more conviction in themselves this season.

INTERMILAN

I am surprised by the departure of Hernan Crespo. (Nigerian striker Obafemi) Martins is an exciting talent and Mohammed Kallon is a good player but I don't think either will be capable of reaching the goal-scoring level of Crespo -- they are good players but not yet stars. I am sure the club had their reasons for letting Crespo go though. I hope they find the solutions.

Last year they suffered from a lack of consistency in midfield and on the wings. In midfield, they have let Luigi Di Biagio go and I think the partner for Cristiano Zanetti will be (Turkish midfielder) Emre, unless the rumours linking them with (Chievo and Italy midfielder Simone) Perrotta come to fruition --he is very consistent. The defence looks okay but maybe they need to look at extra cover for Francesco Coco at left back.

AS ROMA

I think they have the best midfield in the league in Olivier Dacourt, Emerson and Francesco Totti, I don't think anyone can match them in that department.

But reading the newspapers, there is a lot of talk about problems between the coach (Fabio Capello) and the president (Franco Sensi) and that could cause trouble. In attack they had problems last year with Vincenzo Montella -- he is an excellent player and they need to recover the real Montella.

Their big hope is for (young striker) Antonio Cassano to really explode this season. In defence, they have brought in Cristian Chivu who I consider to be an excellent player.

LAZIO

They are a very strong side, with midfielders who can get goals and lots of strong characters in the dressing room. To go for the title, though, they need a striker who can score 20 goals in a season.

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