https://www.thesirenssong.com/lates...napoli-manager-sacked-de-laurentiis-ancelottiVery strange hire considering Carlo isn't really known for winning league titles
Shocking to move away from Sarri despite their late collapse in Serie A - he was building something special at Napoli but seems clear this was to mitigate what was already looking like Sarri angling for a move to Chelski
Sarri at Chelsea
Emery at Arsenal
Klopp at Liverpool
Pep at City
Not bad, Premiership could get a lot more interesting but everyone will be chasing you lot
Yes, regardless of whether or not Abramovich is granted his visa, he’ll know now that the original - and let’s face it very successful - idea to raise his profile by lavishing success on a premier league football team doesn’t keep him safe from geo-political manouvres now.
They got very lucky when the won the champions league in 2012 and have done well with the academy farm system which UEFA are now looking at.
Couple this with some highly suspicious fees for the likes of Luiz and Oscar and they’ve continued to progress and be ok financially.
However, City, United and Liverpool will pull away from them now and I suspect they’ll be back vying with West Ham for the 3rd best club in the capital within 5 years. That’s just my opinion.
Anyone know who’s spent time in London will know Arsenal and Spurs have a far bigger local fan base.
I'm not saying they won't spend money, of course they will. However, other clubs in this league have far more pulling power than them now, they aren't getting the top range of player anymore and will suffer because of this.We can only guess what's going to happen with Abramovich and the visa saga, but I wouldn't be too quick to write them off. Whatever we think of his hire and fire policy - and I believe he's too trigger-happy - he strikes me as someone who is a passionate supporter so I can't see him suddenly "getting bored". I also think their reduced spending is more to do with the new stadium, and the cost of it, than anything else. In any case, they still spent a fair old wedge last season but most of the signings just haven't come off so far.
I do think Abramovich craves a more entertaining brand of football and Sarri would fit the bill, but for once he would need to give him time. Abramovich would have to be prepared to accept that the first season at least might need to be written off while Sarri gets to grips with imposing his style of football on the players.
Towards the end of the season with Napoli and Juve vying for Serie A, Napoli beat Juve away, Inter then 2-1 up v Juve in the next match with three mins to go having been down to 10 men for 70 minutes, Juve score twice to win it (great game), Napoli still had a good chance to win the league but bottled it losing 3-0 at Fiorentina and drawing with Torino at home. As you say probably down to burn out, lack of a plan B and a really rigid playing formation. It was a shame they didn't win it, shows how good our CL performance was against them.
Good post, enjoyed thatYes, I too watched the relatively recent Napoli vs Juve game, which in my mind represented the new forward playing progressive Italian team which enthralled the domestic audience against the old-school archaic traditional Italian approach play. There was only one team who wanted/needed to win that match, even though it took a last minute bullet header for Koulibaly to do so.
To me the reason why we were so successful against Napoli in both legs and especially the first half of the first leg where we blitzed Napoli is because they were not used to teams pressurising them successfully & similar to us against Liverpool lost balls in crucial areas of the field where we hurt them. For most of the season Napoli were used to getting their own way & playing at their own tempo.
I suppose you can't argue against Ancelotti's managerial credentials compared to Sarri & he most likely will bring a winning mentality to the squad which has been missing for a while now (once again similar to what Mancini did for us) but at what cost in the change of football style. I just hope he keeps Sarri's football philosophy at Napoli as a foundation to work from & tweaks the weaknesses for them to become successful, rather than enforcing an overhaul in both personnel & football style.
The dippers raise their game for certain games like us then they drop back to their level for the rest so scraping 4th is their level over 38 games,the rags don't seem a happy camp and maureen is due his meltdown,we have only to match our standard and hunger and we'll be too good for them bothI think Liverpool and Utd will be your main threats.