The Azzurri overwhelm Sassuolo 6-1 but the fans all contest the Maradona. Contrasting views between the coach and the Belgian goalscorer
Let’s rewind the tape and go back to last summer. After the despair for the Champions League which vanished in the last match, if any fan had been told: in the next championship with a goal of 6 goals at Maradona, the team will qualify for the Champions League with three days to go, everyone would have been willing to sign. Okay, one point is still missing for certainty arithmetic. Yes, but who can think that in addition to winning four consecutive games (and Napoli losing three), Roma can recover a gap of 21 goals in goal difference (+36 against +15)? It could have been an afternoon of celebration but nothing. Protest outside and inside a stadium with only children brought from schools – to fill the stands with many gaps – to cheer candidly, while insults to the president and the players departed from the curves, not even mitigated in the end for the victory. With only Koulibaly and Mertens who manage in the end to turn some whistles into applause. Luciano Spalletti doesn’t like it and underlines the importance of the result: “I don’t understand playing an important match like the one against Sassuolo in a climate of contestation and I’m sorry for the players. What is the work of the whole year must prevail, because having the almost certainty of entering the Champions League with three games to spare is not easy. It is clear that there is some regret in some matches, but these have been replaced by big wins on difficult fields. It was I who talked about the Scudetto to try to raise the level of determination of the boys, to go beyond the obstacle “.
Ciro’s answer
–
Meanwhile Mertens, in the interview on the sidelines of Dazn, had undoubtedly embraced the disappointment of the fans: “The whole team is disappointed, in the nine years that I have been here this has been the year in which I am most disappointed. Once we got 91 points and we didn’t win. But this time it’s different, the other teams weren’t stronger than us. Of course there are also Rome, Lazio, Juve, Atalanta, who are behind. Now let’s raise our heads, let’s go to the Champions League and hope that next year we can fight again because we have a great group ”. He doesn’t want to talk about his renewal but the Belgian from Posillipo speaks as a leader, recognized both on and off the pitch: “I’m talking to the fans. This year we have all dreamed and made mistakes, but now we must not give up, it is bad for us too. We must always be together. We hope to get strong players for next year ”. Ciro finishes speaking live, while from the press room, connected to the same TV, Spalletti hears him replying immediately (even if Mertens leaves the field and does not realize that the coach is speaking). “The camp said the others are stronger. Otherwise, tell who according to him was insufficient, whose responsibility is it “. Differences of views, but not recently. Because from a serious and in-depth internal analysis you can understand what needs to be improved in a future that has yet to be written. Which starts from the certainty of qualifying for the Champions League, but also from balance sheets to balance that will lead De Laurentiis to sell several players.
Lost opportunity
–
Spalletti does well to put the dots on the i’s of a season with possible different readings. But when he begins to see ghosts or external attacks he realizes that over the last week Napoli have done everything by themselves, disconcerting the whole environment. Yesterday the same coach stressed that it was “absurd to send a third-placed team into retreat”. But on that Sunday of madness, after Empoli, it was he who supported the decision of an angry president, who in turn defined that choice “archaic”. And if we want to think that the basis of the six goals scored against Sassuolo are the two “clarifying” dinners – and Spalletti himself sarcastically emphasizes “then let’s go to breakfast too” – then one wonders why this type of intervention De Laurentiis did not do it months before, when it came to the Scudetto. And here lies the anger of many fans, not necessarily organized. The feeling remains that an opportunity like that of winning this year in the league for Napoli who knows for how many decades will not happen again. And it’s a hard fact to deny. This is sport and you have to accept it, without necessarily indicating scapegoats. But if Napoli think that the enemies are out, it will be yet another missed opportunity to grow.
May 1st – 09:35 am
© REPRODUCTION RESERVED
#Naples #opposing #visions #Spalletti #Great #year #Mertens #disappointed