MILAN: Napoli’s hopes of a first Serie A title since the days of Diego Maradona suffered a blow on Sunday after they slumped to a 3-2 home defeat to Europe-chasing Fiorentina.
Last champions in 1990, Napoli would have moved top of the pile with a win in front of 50,000 fans in Naples but they stay a point behind league leaders AC Milan after goals from Nicolas Gonzalez, Jonathan Ikone and Arthur Cabral condemned Luciano Spalletti’s side to a painful defeat.
They could end the weekend four points off the pace with six games remaining in an exciting campaign as Milan travel to Torino in Sunday’s late match.
Napoli sit third, level on 66 points with Inter Milan whose title challenge is back on track following their 2-0 win over Verona on Saturday.
The manner in which southern Italy’s biggest club flopped on a gorgeous day at the Stadio Maradona does not bode well for the run-in with fierce rivals Roma coming to town next weekend hunting a place in the Champions League.
Napoli were the better side until Gonzalez opened the scoring on the half hour with a thumping finish off the post, after which the hosts almost vanished from the field until the introduction of Dries Mertens 10 minutes after the break.
Mertens’ first act was to almost lift the roof off the stadium by drilling home a superb first-time finish from Victor Osimhen’s cut back, but the roars of the passionate crowd were soon extinguished by two quick-fire Fiorentina goals.
Just eight minutes had elapsed since Mertens’ leveller when Ikone collected Gonzalez’s cross and rifled his team back into the lead, and jeers began ringing around the ground in the 72nd minute when Cabral brilliantly curled in the third.
Osimhen, who had struggled all day to get the better of the brilliant Igor Julio, smashed home his 12th league goal of the season which will offer little consolation to the Nigerian and his teammates.
Earlier Ciro Immobile shot to the top of the Serie A scoring charts with a hat-trick in Lazio’s 4-1 win at struggling Genoa which moved them up to fifth.
Italy forward Immobile took his league tally to 24 goals in 27 games this season in a victory which put Lazio in the Europa League spot, one point ahead of local rivals Roma who face Salernitana later on Sunday.
The 32-year-old has two more than Juventus forward Dusan Vlahovic after netting with a beautiful low finish on the stroke of half-time to put Lazio two ahead and adding two more in the second period.