A high-profile duel that will take place this Tuesday at the Diego Armando Maradona. Naples, current champion of Serie A, receives Real Madrid, absolute monarch of the Champions League with its fourteen continental crowns, in a match that is shaping up to be a litmus test for the whites to examine the muscle they have in their competition. fetish. Bellingham’s stoppage time goal saved the Chamartín team from being burned in their debut a couple of weeks ago against Union Berlin, but the team led by Carlo Ancelotti needs to hit the table in the Italian coach’s return to the old San Paolo to reaffirm his candidacy for the Fifteenth.
Ancelotti led Naples for a season and a half. In his first campaign, he led the southern Italian team to a creditable runners-up in Serie A. In the second, things went wrong and Aurelio De Laurentiis gave him the passport in December, with Napoli occupying seventh position in the table , to throw herself into the arms of Gennaro Gattuso. Carletto felt betrayed by his replacement, whom he had had as a disciple at Milan. He still has not forgotten that affront.
«Carlo is an outlier, he just had the bad luck of not liking the Neapolitans. He was not ready to achieve it and the Curves never saw him as one of ours,” De Laurentiis, the volcanic leader who has governed the plans of Naples since 2004, would maintain some time later. He bought the club when it was on the brink of disappearance, in the catacombs of Serie C. In three years, the film producer managed to revive it and return it to Serie A, from which it has not left again. Under his aegis, Naples has won three Cups and one Italian Super Cup. But the jewel in the crown was the ‘Scudetto’ that they won last year, with Luciano Spalletti on the bench and with five days left until the conclusion of the tournament. It had been 33 years since Napoli had seen such success. Since a certain Diego Armando Maradona wore the ’10’ on his shirt.
Spalletti abandoned ship last May. He had a contract in force, but he considered that he had exhausted one cycle. His intention was to take a sabbatical year. The call from the ‘Azzurra’ altered the plans of the Tuscan coach. In Naples they continue to miss him.
‘Kvaradona’ points to the team of his loves
To replace him, De Laurentiis opted for Rudi García, formerly of Roma who returned to Europe after an experience at Saudi Al-Nassr. His beginnings on the banks of Vesuvius did not invite optimism. Two draws and a defeat in the first five rounds of the Italian championship began to generate some saber rattling. Napoli also suffered to beat Braga away in the Champions League. Niakaté’s own goal at the edge of regulation time gave three golden points to a team that had taken the lead through Di Lorenzo, but was punished by Bruma in the final stretch of the match. Osimhen and Kvaratskhelia, main pillars of the historic ‘Scudetto’, tiptoed through the Braga Municipal Stadium.
The Georgian, who dreams of wearing the Real Madrid jersey, scored 19 goals and distributed 16 assists last season. At present he has only signed one goal and three decisive deliveries. His relationship with Rudi García is not harmonious. ‘Kvaradona’ also misses Spalletti.
Osimhen’s case is more complex. The Nigerian has maintained a tug-of-war with De Laurentiis practically since he arrived in Naples as the most expensive signing in the history of the Partenopeans. The last episode was the video that the club published on the Tik Tok platform mocking a penalty missed by the forward. The African’s reaction was furious, but the waters seem to have calmed down on the eve of the visit of Real Madrid, an entity that put him on their radar when he was playing for Lille and Zinedine Zidane was the whites’ helmsman. He has just scored against Udinese and Lecce, two matches resolved with two goals that have brought joy back to Naples.
Real Madrid also attends the event with high morale. The victories against Las Palmas and Girona have allowed the whites to digest the setback of the derby in the Metropolitano, regain the league lead and focus once again on the Champions League, their Holy Grail. The Chamartín club chose the same hotel where De Laurentiis gave Ancelotti his passport as its headquarters for its visit to Parthenopean lands. Surely the Reggiolo coach wants to settle scores. Modric, unprecedented in the last two games, points to the eleven, possibly with Camavinga again at left back. The question is whether Rodrygo, a substitute in Girona, will once again form an attacking duo with Vinicius or whether Joselu will remain on fire.
-Probable alignments:
Naples: Meret, Di Lorenzo, Ostigard, Natan, Olivera, Anguissa, Lobotka, Zielinski, Politano, Osimhen and Kvaratskhelia.
Real Madrid: Kepa, Carvajal, Rüdiger, Nacho, Camavinga, Tchouaméni, Valverde, Modric, Bellingham, Rodrygo and Vinicius.
Referee: Clément Turpin (France).
Time: 9:00 p.m.
Stadium: Diego Armando Maradona.
TV: Movistar Champions League.
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