“Fiorentina are not just Adrian Mutu and Alberto Gilardino, as they have at least seven or eight key players. They are stronger than us, but we are slowly getting back on track.

“Bad periods sometimes occur and it has happened to other top sides. The important thing is to keep calm and work hard,” said the Coach.

It’s not an easy task when the fans are staging protests against the team at the training ground and leaving early during a 3-0 home loss to Milan.

“I saw improvements against Milan and for long spells we were on a par with them. We need to work on the fact that at the first sign of difficulty we tend to fall apart.

“It is important to leave the players relaxed and without too much pressure. They know the results aren’t coming and that we’re not doing well, but they need to be left in peace to rediscover their self-confidence.

“In any case, we are not yet at the point where we need to bring in a psychiatrist…”

The Biancocelesti had been leading the standings in the early weeks, but have plummeted recently.

“We are the same team and deserve better than 10th place,” assured Rossi. “Perhaps we have lost a little sharpness, but the problem now is we have too many peaks and troughs.”

Tommaso Rocchi, Mourad Meghni and Mobido Diakhitè are injured, while Stefan Radu and Sebastiano Siviglia sit out bans.

According to the latest reports, Pasquale Foggia is the favourite to start behind Goran Pandev and Mauro Zarate rather than Stefano Mauri.

Lazio squad: Brocchi, Carrizo, Matuzalem, Rozehnal, Cribari, Dabo, De Silvestri, Kolarov, Faraoni, Foggia, Ledesma, Mauri, Lichtsteiner, Manfredini, Inzaghi, Muslera, Mendicino, Pandev, Tuia, Zarate.