Roma and Fiorentina had already put their official lineups on the board before the 20.45 kickoff, and the biggest note in them was simple: Lulli and Mora were in from the start for Roma, while Kean was not in Fiorentina's XI.
That is the detail fans were looking for because the match was being shown exclusively on Dazn, and the starting teams were the last confirmed pre-match information before the league opener began. Gasperini went with Svilar, Mancini, N'Dicka, Hermoso, Lulli, Cristante, Koné, Wesley, Dybala, Mora and Malen in a 3-4-2-1 shape, a setup that also left no room for Soulè in the first Roma lineup circulated before kickoff.
Fiorentina's first official match of the season had already come the previous week, when it beat Benevento 4-1 in Coppa Italia, and Kean had scored in that win. That made his omission from the lineup for Roma-Fiorentina the most noticeable change on the Fiorentina side, even as Grosso named De Gea, Dodò, Dragusin, Ranieri, Joao Mario, Ndour, Fagioli, Brescianini, Mastantuono, Atta and Pellegrino in a 4-3-2-1 formation.
The same pre-match update also showed a second Roma lineup with Molina, Cristante, Koné, Wesley, Soulè, Dybala and Malen, and a second Fiorentina list with De Gea, Joao Mario, Dragusin, Ranieri, Valdepenas, Ndour, Fagioli, Mandragora, Gudmundsson, Atta and Pellegrino. That makes the late team news more than a routine formality: Roma had arrived after a mixed summer that included a draw with Borussia Dortmund, a heavy loss to Brighton and a win against Newport County, while Fiorentina came in already sharpened by one official outing and now faced the first real question of its league campaign.
For now, the confirmed takeaway is that the match was set to begin at 20.45 with both lineups published and Kean sidelined from the start. What mattered next was whether that choice held up once Roma-Fiorentina got underway on Dazn.
