Napoli's Champions League path narrows after six points lost

Gazzetta dello Sport has crunched the numbers from recent Champions League editions, and after two defeats Napoli's route to the last 16 is tight.

by Gennaro SanninoWednesday 14 October, 16:25 CET· 2 hours ago

Champions, la matematica è dura: al Napoli servono cinque vittorie su sei per gli ottavi — Grafica Arena Napoli

Napoli have no points after two matches, following a 0-1 home defeat to Arsenal and a 3-1 loss at Villarreal, and the Champions League league phase is already getting difficult. Gazzetta dello Sport has lined up the qualification thresholds from recent editions to work out how many points are actually needed, from here to the six matches that remain, to avoid missing out altogether.

The reference point is last season, the first with the single-league format. Finishing in the automatic top eight needed just 16 points — the total Manchester City had when they finished eighth. Real Madrid, ninth on 15, dropped into the play-offs instead. The play-off threshold was lower, at 9 points, which is what 24th-placed Benfica collected. On 8 points, one below that line, PSV, Athletic Bilbao, Napoli and Copenhagen were all eliminated.

Applied to this season, Gazzetta's conclusion is blunt: to have a reasonable degree of certainty of finishing in the top eight, Napoli and Inter would need at least five wins and a draw from their remaining six matches. For the play-offs, three wins and two draws would be enough to feel safe, while three wins alone would leave a lot depending on how the other teams in contention fare.

For Napoli the problem is that the count starts from zero. After the 0-1 home defeat to Arsenal and the 3-1 loss at Villarreal, the points column is still empty after two of the eight matchdays. That means the chase for five wins and a draw, if direct qualification remains the target, has to start as early as the next round: on Tuesday 20 October, at the Maradona, against Bodø/Glimt.

Two matches, zero points: at Villarreal it was Politano himself, after the back-pass that let Villarreal back into the game, who admitted that "we're missing team spirit." Gazzetta's maths turns that admission into a concrete problem — it is no longer enough to play a good half, as happened against Villarreal, if the result does not follow. For a fanbase that regards the Champions League as the club's natural stage, another European campaign spent struggling would weigh heavier than the league table.

ci manca lo spirito di squadra

The countdown on those six heavy points restarts with Bodø/Glimt: that is where it will become clear whether Napoli really are chasing the five-win threshold, or whether the league phase is already turning into a battle for ninth place.