SSC Napoli 1-0 Udinese Calcio: Serie A Match Report

Napoli finished the season the way they had spent the closing month of it — narrowly, and with the points: SSC Napoli 1-0 Udinese Calcio, one goal scored before half-time and then protected for the remainder of the afternoon.

They came into the final round on 73 points, having gone into the closing fortnight second on 70 with a +18 goal difference from 36 games and then won 3-0 at bottom club Pisa. Udinese arrived 10th on 50 with a difference of -2, safe, settled in mid-table, and playing for nothing in particular after losing at home to Cremonese the week before. On paper the mismatch was clear. In practice Napoli found one goal and then had to defend it for 45 minutes against a team with no urgency of its own.

A 1-0 with the goal coming in the first half is the least dramatic way to close a campaign, and it fitted Napoli's underlying numbers well. A +21 goal difference is modest for a side finishing second — Como, sixth going into the same fortnight, carried +32 — and it describes a team that won often without winning heavily. The last day was that pattern in miniature.

The three points took Napoli to 76 and second place in Serie A. The title had gone before either of these closing fixtures kicked off: Inter had 85 points with two rounds left against Napoli's 70, which put the Scudetto beyond arithmetic. What remained was the runners-up position and the qualification order beneath it, and Napoli settled both. Their 76 finished three clear of Roma on 73, five clear of Como on 71, and above Juventus, who drew their last match and could reach no higher than 72, and Milan, capped at 70 after losing at home to Cagliari. Two wins from two secured the best finish available behind the champions.

Udinese stayed on 50 points, closing a season that never threatened either end of the table — twenty-one short of the European places, sixteen clear of the relegated side in 18th.

Our pre-match call was Double Chance 1X (SSC Napoli or Draw) at 1.42. Napoli won, so the draw leg was surplus to requirements. This was the most defensible of the round's short-priced double chances: a side with second place still to nail down, at home, against a mid-table opponent with nothing at stake, where both a win and a draw returned. The one reservation — that a +21 goal difference did not describe a team likely to overwhelm anyone — was borne out by the 1-0, but absorbing exactly that kind of narrow outcome is what the double chance is for. Verdict: won