Scudetto duel between Inter and Napoli, Milan’s struggle, the missteps of Juventus and Roma and other news that emerged from the penultimate round of the first round of Serie A.
The first football weekend of the new year has written some truths that will accompany the championship until the end of the season. They are not yet final sentences, but the strong feeling is that nothing is happening by chance and that hierarchies are crystallizing in an important way. It was an intense round, with few goals (19) and some results with notable specific weight.
The prospect of the match between Inter and Napoli next Sunday (8.45pm at San Siro), with the last round of the first leg in the middle of the week, helps to paint the picture of a month – January – which will provide answers to many questions.
1 – Inter and Napoli are well, perhaps very well, and arrive at the direct clash in full condition. Conte inaugurated the two-nil trend in Riyadh, christened his top players and created a new Napoli on the ashes of the one mistreated in Lisbon and Udine. Chivu can’t ask anything else from his Inter other than to be more cynical;
2 – anyone who thinks that this is a “throwaway” championship sprint, with the Italian team’s quota just over 80 points, resign themselves: just to give an element, Chivu can turn halfway through the championship with 45 points and a projection of 90 (today it is 87) and Conte is just below even with a thousand problems that both had to overcome;
3 – Milan is not out but seems to be hanging on to the pace of the other two. Allegri is making a masterpiece, the question is how long he will lastgiven that the best thing about the Rossoneri in Cagliari was their ability to risk almost nothing;
4 – watch out Inter’s January championship calendar: apart from Napoli there are Lecce and Pisa at San Siro and the away games with Parma, Udinese, Cremonese and Sassuolo. What thoughts does it bring to mind?
5 – Conte has found the perfect balance with a handful of players but will have to face 8 matches in the next 28 days and has understood that the market is unlikely to give him something new. Had he wanted to invest, De Laurentiis would have resolved the situation of the financial parameters without running into the limitations in January;
6 – the missteps of Juventus and Roma have removed the veil from the championship race. Only the asterisk that accompanies Inter, Napoli and Milan until mid-January hides the gap that has been dug between the top three and the others;
7 – Spalletti is without an attack and it is a huge problem for Juventus who now have a tactical logic but who cannot afford to give away matches like the one against Lecce. Also because the race for fourth place will be very close;
8 – Rome is exhausted: 4 defeats in the last 6 days. It’s not a coincidence, it’s a cry of alarm;
9 – Lazio’s problem was not and is not the referees. Now that the market has been unblocked Lotito can give Sarri what he denied him in the summer, but the departure is the untimely transfer of Castellanos and the opening to let Guendouzi leave…
10 – Fiorentina is alive and fighting to save itself. The victory against Cremonese weighs tripleespecially on the morale of an environment in shock which must, however, keep in mind that to remain in Serie A it may be enough to average just over one point per match between now and May. Not impossible.
