Napoli-Lazio 0-1: goal from Isaksen

Well, well done (Baroni), encore: repetita juvant, they said, and it takes Lazio three days to give themselves another fairytale night. After having knocked Napoli out of the Italian Cup, Thursday at the Olimpico, but at the “Maradona” and makes them fall from first to second place (with Inter, third, who have to recover a match) and sends Conte into crisis, at its second home defeat, after the 0-3 suffered by Atalanta, the new league leaders. Isaksen scores in the 34th minute of the second half, he does it on the counterattack against an unbalanced team and with the complicity of Olivera, who misses the diagonal and coverage: however the Dane does his part, with a dry, treacherous and delicious razor (deflected by the Uruguayan ) which exalts a team, Lazio, capable of playing without fear. Lazio are no longer a surprise, they are demonstrating it with that authority that smacks of great: they lose Romagnoli (due to injury), they see Castellanos pass away (yellow card which will make him miss Inter) but they proceed according to very respectable, indeed praiseworthy, choices. Baroni’s Lazio defends but knows how to attack and when they do so, they leave marks on the flesh of others.

revolution

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And therefore: the same teams, but different compared to Thursday evening. Conte displays his eleven jewels, the ones that put him in the lead (before the race); Baroni has nine new faces: it’s not a small thing if you think about it but they will be enough for him, the pitch will say. It’s a game that tastes like something else, obviously, it doesn’t get boring but it doesn’t get boring, it lives on flashes but also on organisation, especially Lazio’s defense which falters only twice: at the start (3′) on McTominay’s turn, after a sparkling action Di Lorenzo-Politano, on which Provedel gets his hands; then at the end of the first half (47′), when Kvara’s free-kick narrowly missed… In the middle there is a bit of Napoli and a lot of Lazio, who know how to cover themselves with mastery, personality and a fair amount of nerve (20′ ): Isaksen’s left-footed shot would go into the far corner if the prodigious Meret didn’t get there. Then, there are cross-matches: Di Lorenzo with Zaccagni, Dia who shadows Lobotka, Politano and the returning Tavares, Guendouzi with McTominay and Dele-Bashiru with Anguissa; Marusic with Kvara and the center forwards abandoned to their identical fate. Happens!

empty areas

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We need to fill the two penalty areas and it’s not easy so there are those who try from distance, for example Dele-Bashiru who in the 7th minute of the second half shook the crossbar and Maradona with a terrifying stone. Lazio have to give up Romagnoli (knee problems), Napoli have some hope of taking the lead again because Anguissa (27′) kisses the outside post with his header and can curse the wind or the rain which he hasn’t abandoned for a the evening moment. But it is not the water that extinguishes the blue flame at the top of the table and definitively, with eleven minutes to go: Napoli wanders around completely exposed, Lazio comes out with the dribble, leaning on Noslin, who delicately arrives on the right on the very fast Isaksen. Olivera doesn’t know what to do, he doesn’t cover or intervene and that ball smacks of happiness for Lazio (fifth with 31 points with Fiorentina and Inter) and for Atalanta: crazy (the) Goddess you can say now.