Allegri admits Napoli keep blowing leads after 3-3 draw with Roma

Allegri put it plainly in his press conference: "Over the course of the season we have been pegged back many times." The match against Roma, a 3-3 draw, proved his point.

Admitting the problem is the minimum. The question supporters have been asking for weeks is what Napoli will do to stop conceding these comebacks. Allegri's words offer no answer.

Badiashile and the fitness question

Allegri also explained Badiashile's injury. "I rested Badiashile on Tuesday on purpose, but it was not enough to avoid the injury. Sadly he is coming back from eight months out." Beukema came on at 52 minutes, so the defence changed shape early.

The explanation is coherent, but it shifts the debate to fitness and to the decision to start a player returning from a long layoff. Supporters are already arguing about conditioning and injuries. "I can't say anything to the lads" does not close that argument: the person who picks the starting XI answers for it too.

Anguissa and Gasperini

Anguissa took a different line. Of his goal he told Dazn: "I saw the ball and I hit it well. It wasn't planned: I saw the ball and it came out like that." On the mood in the squad he said: "The coach is very positive and we try to be positive with him." On the finish: "They did well to score."

The goal is a good one. But after a 3-3 draw that followed a two-goal lead, crediting the opposition makes the dropped points sound like something Napoli suffered, not something they chose. His line that "there are points to be won" is fair, but it is what you say at the start of a season, not after a game your side had in hand.

For Roma, Gasperini said: "Morale is high, we have the feeling of having lost two points." At the Maradona, it is the side that came back that has the high morale, and that says more about how the evening ended than most analysis could.

He also called Napoli "a great point of reference: they have won the scudetto twice" and said that "if you are competitive against Napoli, you can compete with anyone." It is a compliment to the recent past, and it brings no comfort now.

On Wednesday 28 October at Monza, Napoli will show whether Allegri's words about the comebacks remain an observation or become work done.