As Conte did (immediately) come back great Napoli
First place in the standings, the best defense of the championship, 15 goals conceded in 22 days, and the direct clash with Inter on March 2 to be played at Maradona. If we then put Napoli does not have cups, Antonio Conte’s team is the favorite for the Scudetto, even if Inter do not give up and has three points less with the game with Fiorentina to be recovered: according to experts the Quota to win the tricolor is around 90 points and at the moment the Neapolitans have 53, the same as in the entire championship last season. Conte with Napoli, in fact, could be yet another sports masterpiece, which in some respects very much resembles that made with Juventus in 2011-12, winning the title of unbeaten and with the best defense of the tournament. By expressing also a fresh, sparkling and, in some respects, new game, even if this has not always been recognized in Conte, which is why it has often regretted it, both privately and publicly. And here is the union between two eternal outsider: on the one hand Napoli who in recent years has represented a reality and a first -rate square of Italian football; on the other Count – Antonio, not Giuseppe, I recommend – which boasts 8 coach trophies (5 of which won with Juve), plus a championship of B and various individuals, and 13 as a footballer, conquered all in black and white. Here, both told little and bad, compared to other teams, to other realities and, above all, to other coaches, on which real hagiographies have been built and built in front of “zero tituli”.
De Laurentiis defused
Among the many qualities of Conte – that outside hypocrisy, and beyond the biability stories, remains that of Juventus, one of the Juventus most hated by the opponents, a lot of determination and little sympathy – the most important was to know how to defuse Aurelio De Laurentiis who, despite having enormous merits in these twenty years of presidency at the helm of Napoli, with three Italian Cups, an Italian Super Cup and, above all, the Scudetto of 2023, the third of Neapolitan history, at the level of communication, both media and interpersonal some damage did it, especially with Luciano Spalletti, dismantling in a few seconds everything he had been built: making his eyes crawled in the football world; Both in terms of the game and that of the accounts, even his personal ones according to the detractors. Aurelio De Laurentiis and Antonio Conte are two strong, unpleasant, obsessed and obsessive personalities in reaching the summit, whatever it is, unable to diplomacy, especially when they feel on the side of the strongest, prone to sarcasm and the controversy. Many had predicted that they would break out and Napoli with them, instead no, instead there is a president who does his and a coach who does everything else, a bit like Mourinho at Inter; Certainly also Gabriele Oriali in the role of Instreine. With a purchase campaign of 150 million euros and entered for 82.5, but only thanks to the 70 for Khvicha Kvaratskhelia, who chose the PSG: the only thing in which Conte was unable to bring the Georgian back to the center of the village Neapolitan, but knowing, at the same time, insert three pawns such as Lukaku, MCTominay and Neres in the team. An Antonio Conte capable of recovering, revitalizing and re-evaluating footballers such as Anguissa-extraordinary player and extraordinarily underwater in the media-, Politano and Spinazzola, who also against Juventus, in the last championship victory 2-1 in comeback, which says a lot about the Character of the team and his coach, they represented one of the main axes of Napoli.
the DNA Juve and the Neapolitan heart
After the victory of the Neapolitans in Bergamo, a very heavy victory, reassembling, making himself reassemble and then shameing the final hit with the usual Lukaku – 9 the league’s goals of the Belgian attacker -, Antonio Conte has shown a side of himself until today, Capopopolo’s: bringing to the surface, in a domineering way, the love of the Neapolitan fans for him, fans who have always estimated him and in the ‘courted’ years, despite the black and white past, a past that, as he said before the Challenge against Juve, it is there, present, and it is not clear. Antonio Conte as a footballer played with Lecce and Juventus. As a coach he sat on the benches of Arezzo, Bari, Atalanta, Siena, Juventus, Chelsea, Inter and Tottenham, with the blue parenthesis from CT, before landing in Naples. In these experiences he built his personality, where the Juventus DNA is overwhelmingly preponderant, in various respects, both from a behavioral point of view, trying to never let himself go, with little profit, since too often he has given the impression of being a Volcano ready to explode, both under the management one. On the other hand, in Italy, among the great teams, only Milan can say that they have its own DNA, Inter, for example, before and after Mourinho won with Trapattoni and Conte (also Mancini is an old Juventus heart), Fiorentina went close to winning the Scudetto with Trap on the bench and Torricelli on the pitch, now Napoli, who has decided to raise their fate with one of the historical enemies, however estimated. That Juve DNA that all the players who have passed by there tell, in which Conte is a prison of grafting a Neapolitan heart. If he succeeds, it will be a huge success, both for him and for the Neapolitans and Napoli.
Win the same normality
Beyond the averting, of the Apotropaic gestures, of the Neapolitan superstitious and also that of Antonio Conte, there is a fundamental aspect in this team that has been and is at the top of the ranking for thirteen days, winter champion in front of Atalanta , first both at home and away and both in the first leg and, for now, in the return: the normality of the victory, the normality of being up there, the normality of aiming to conquer the Scudetto. If Conte will succeed in this, in this and in other seasons – as far as the players will be able to ‘endure’ it -, it will be the most important goal for Naples and the Neapolitans. A goal to be shared with Aurelio De Laurentiis and with some coaches who have marked the Neapolitan history of the last twenty years. By Walter Mazzarri, who reported the team in the Champions League after 21 years, to Rafa Benitez, who made Naples an international square, opening it to players who were not even in the dreams of the fans and who now arrive, conquered by the club, by public and the city. Continued internationalization with Carlo Ancelotti and Rudi Garcia, although the masterpiece, tactical, sports and animistic, Luciano Spalletti has created it. And Maurizio Sarri in all this? He certainly laid the foundations for those who came later, with an important incomprehension, he leveraged, as Maradona did, on Naples and the Neapolitans against all the others and above all against the ‘palace’, depicted with the black and white colors of the 9 consecutive badges, the first three of which won by Antonio Conte. That ‘palace’ that De Laurentiis did not want to contrast but conquer and in part he managed, coming, once the Scudetto once won, to make statements from Marquis del Grillo on other football realities, such as an ordinary Andrea Agnelli. And Sarri? He won the ninth consecutive Scudetto with Juventus. Here, Antonio Conte on the one hand represents the closure of an Italian football circle, on the other the trampoline to bring Naples and Napoli as well as all this.