In recent years, games involving Napoli and Liverpool have been quite the spectacle – with the Italians always being able to rustle our feathers.
The Serie A outfit have manged to pick up seven ‘points’ out of a possible 12 over the last few times we’ve met in the Champions League.
Napoli captain Lorenzo Insigne believes that there may be something psychological behind this as he’s labelled his team our bogey side.
Given the results of late, the Italian international may have a point. “Every time we meet Liverpool we produce great performances,” Insigne is quoted as saying by the Mail,
“Against them we produce stratospheric performances. We became their bogey side. In two games this season we got four points and this leaves us with great satisfaction.
“We left Anfield with a draw that served us well, even if we wanted to advance to the next round with a game to spare.”
Thankfully we’ve never been in a position where the results against Napoli have had any real bearing on our season. We’ve definitely been put to the sword by the Italians, but we haven’t had to pay for it yet.
The results Insigne are talking about come from seasons in which we reached the final of the Champions League – so I’m sure Jurgen Klopp isn’t going to lose any sleep, although we need to nip this bad habit in the bud before it becomes a real problem.
Carlo Ancelotti has moved on from Napoli now – as he’s the new boss at Everton – so it’s unclear whether we will now struggle against a team that will set up entirely different.