Napoli

Home discomforts and Fiorentina damage Napoli’s hopes of the Scudetto | Nicky Bandini

11-Apr-2022 13:22:02 | The Guardian

Four years on from a famous title-chasing failure against Fiorentina, Napoli allowed history to repeat itself

Four years have passed since Napoli “lost a Scudetto in the hotel”. That was how Maurizio Sarri explained things after his then team was thrashed 3-0 by Fiorentina in April 2018, effectively ending their title bid. They had begun the weekend with hopes of going top of the table but suffered an emotional collapse after watching Juventus come from behind to beat Inter the night before.

The Bianconeri trailed that game as late as the 87th minute, despite playing with an extra man for more than an hour. They should have gone down to 10 themselves when Miralem Pjanic, already booked, leapt knee-first into Rafinha at the start of the second-half. Instead, an own goal from Milan Skriniar allowed them back into the match and Gonzalo Higuaín snatched a winner at the death.