Lauria had taken his fleet to Augusta, eastern Sicily, after a report of an Angevin galley fleets landing invasion troops there. He landed his troops, who recaptured the town, leaving the Angevins holed up in the castle. However, the invasion was a decoy and the Angevin galleys had sailed around the south of Sicily and linked up with their allies, forming a fleet about twice the size of Lauria's. Their plan was to land troops in the south-west of Sicily.