There were two big twists in the Serie A title race this weekend as stoppage-time equalisers altered the results of both chief contenders, but their points gap has ultimately remained the same. Defending champions Inter are three points behind leaders Napoli with a game in hand, so there is effectively nothing to separate them in the current standings.
By Neel Shelat
While most of the big five European leagues have not produced that many great title races of late, Italy’s Serie A has been an exception thanks to its competitiveness and unpredictability. In fact, no team has managed to defend the Scudetto since Juventus’ dominance ended in 2020/21. Regardless of whether that trend continues, we look set for another memorable conclusion to the season as Napoli and Inter are going neck-and-neck at the top of the standings while Atalanta will be keen to pounce on any major slip-ups.
Antonio Conte’s instant impact at Napoli
The last couple of years have been topsy-turvy for Napoli, to say the least. The highs of 2022/23 – when the Serie A title came to Naples for the first time in over three decades – will likely not be matched anytime soon, but fans were swiftly brought back down to earth in 2023/24. The team looked like a shadow of its former self after the departure of head coach Luciano Spalletti, whose boots proved too big to fill. The club went through three head coaches en route to a 10th-place finish – their worst in 15 years.
Hopes were naturally not that high for this season, even more so since the Partenopei lost some key players in the summer transfer window including midfielder Piotr Zieliński and star striker Victor Osimhen. Although the new head coach who came through the door was four-time Scudetto winner Antonio Conte, few would have expected him to lead an instant title charge.
Indeed, the former Chelsea tactician got off to quite a shaky start in the south of Italy. Napoli needed penalties to beat second-tier Modena in their first competitive match of the season, while their Serie A opener ended in a comprehensive 3-0 defeat to Hellas Verona. However, they then seemed to turn a page as they won nine of the next ten games, and they have hardly looked back ever since.
Interestingly, Conte abandoned his generally favoured 3-4-3 system quite early on in the season. Although Napoli still do adopt a back-three-based shape both in and out of possession in certain situations, they have lined up in a 4-3-3 since late September. This system seems well-suited to get the best out of the players in the squad and has certainly worked from a defensive perspective.
Using their rock-solid defence, Napoli have edged out as many as eight wins by a one-goal margin so far this season. However, this does mean that their attack isn’t quite up there with the best. They are only fifth in terms of goals scored in the league and have looked prone to being blanked by disciplined defences. Conte’s trusted line leader Romelu Lukaku has been quite good, but he does not have a reliable strike partner after the mid-season departure of Khvicha Kvaratskelia.
Inter remain exceptionally well-rounded
Defending champions Inter are the favourites for many experts thanks to their all-round excellence. Simone Inzaghi has ensured that the Nerazzurri have remained up there with the very best teams in the world over the last couple of years by maintaining exceptional balance in his 3-5-2 system.
Their world-class defensive solidity has been on display for all of Europe this season as they conceded just once in well over 700 minutes of UEFA Champions League action. Their midfield has a great mix of experience and dynamism that enables it to control proceedings against all sorts of opponents, while their attack is simply irresistible when it clicks (which is quite often). Although some of their forwards’ form has been fluctuating, Inter have so many sources for goals including their strikers, wing-backs, midfielders and even wide centre-backs! It should be no surprise, then, that they have scored in every single one of their Serie A matches this season.
The current title holders can boast of the league’s best underlying numbers in both attack and defence at the moment, so they surely have to be backed to retain the Scudetto for the first time in 15 years.
Atalanta still in with an outside shout
While Napoli and Inter look set to be the two chief protagonists of the Serie A title race, it is worth mentioning Atalanta as well. The Bergamo-based club have never managed to get their hands on the top-flight title in their 117-year history, but they looked on course to changing that earlier this season.
La Dea led the standings in the month of December, but their streaky form has cost them since. They also started the season poorly by losing three of their first five league matches, though they soon turned things around to string together an 11-match winning streak in the division. However, they have won just one of their subsequent seven matches in domestic competition, thus dropping seven points behind the league leaders.
Atalanta’s attack has once again been excellent. They are the only team apart from Inter to average over 2 goals per game in Serie A, and each of their favoured front three of Mateo Retegui, Ademola Lookman and Charles De Ketelaere is in double digits for goal involvements. However, their defence seems to be holding them back as they have only kept seven clean sheets in 23 league fixtures and are conceding more than a goal per game on average. Quite simply, this is the difference between them and the top two.
It would be very difficult to overstate how good a job Gian Piero Gasperini has done in his nine years with Atalanta, but he will need to find some more solutions and hope for a bit of assistance from the rest of the league if he is to go one better than last year’s Europa League triumph.
(Cover image from IMAGO)
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