Napoli out of Coppa Italia: More a blessing than a curse?

Napoli were dumped out of the Coppa Italia at the Round of 16 stage after falling to a 3-1 defeat against Lazio at the Stadio Olimpico on Thursday evening, but if anything, the loss only comes to benefit Antonio Conte and his team in the long run, writes Peter Young.

Lazio 3-1 Napoli: Conte knocked out of Coppa Italia

Conte called for a heavily-rotated Partenopei side at the Olimpico on Thursday night. There was no Khvicha Kvaratskhelia in the starting XI, no Romelu Lukaku either, nor Matteo Politano, Scott McTominay, Stanislva Lobotka or Alessandro Buongiorno.

Marco Baroni made wholesale changes to his Lazio team as well, resting the likes of Nuno Tavares, Matteo Guendouzi, Taty Castellanos and Boulaye Dia.

It was the Biancocelesti celebrating come full-time. though, largely in thanks to Tijjani Noslin’s hat-trick.

The two teams are, of course, due to play each other again in Serie A on Sunday evening as Conte and his team look to extend their lead at the top of the league standings and create a bigger gap between themselves and Lazio, who are just four points off the top after 14 matches.

Coppa Italia defeat: Blessing or a curse for Conte and Napoli? 

Though a run in the cup would have lifted morale around the Partenopei camp, and a place in the final tournament would have also brought extra revenues into Aurelio De Laurentiis’s coffers, Napoli’s performance against Lazio goes to show that the Serie A title is still very much the priority for Conte this season.

After an annus horribilis in 2023-24, in which Napoli finished 10th, there is no European Football being played at the Stadio Maradona this season.

With Napoli now out of the Coppa Italia as well, Napoli only have Serie A matches to contend with for the remainder of the 2024-25 campaign.

There is absolutely no suggestion that Conte intentionally wanted to lose in the Coppa Italia, but getting knocked out at this stage currently seems like more of a blessing than a curse given the state of the Serie A title race.

Assuming that Inter, Juventus and Atalanta all progress from the Champions League group phase, plus Lazio in the Europa League and Fiorentina in the Conference, Napoli will have already played 10 matches fewer than most of their title contenders this season.

That figure could still increase depending on results in the knock-out rounds, and now, Napoli get up to three extra matches off as a result of getting knocked out of the Coppa Italia.

With the focus now solely on league matches for the remainder of 2024-25 and a re-match of sorts against Lazio coming up on Sunday, it will be incredibly interesting to see whether Napoli can keep up their impressive run of league results until the end of the campaign.