Napoli, Antonio Conte has one'less weapon in Scudetto fight

With still four games to go between now and the end of the Serie A championship, bad news arrives for top-ranked Napoli, which will not be able to count on the performance of defender Alessandro Buongiorno. The 1999-class player had returned from another injury just Sunday against Torino, but had to raise the white flag at 64′, replaced by Rafa Marin.

Napoli released a note on Tuesday afternoon confirming the former granata player’s knockout: “Alessandro Buongiorno underwent instrumental examinations today at Pineta Grande Hospital that showed a distractive injury of the long adductor muscle of the right thigh. The Azzurri footballer has already begun the’rehabilitation process”.

It is difficult, if not impossible, for Buongiorno to recover before May 25, the date of the last day of the Serie A championship: one more problem for Antonio Conte, who will be forced to make a virtue of necessity in the last four days. The calendar on paper is favorable, but among the last opponents are (in addition to Genoa and Cagliari) Lecce and Parma, teams fighting for salvation that will try to steal very heavy points from the partenopei.

This is not the first injury Alessandro Buongiorno has suffered this season: the defender had missed the first league game due to a sprained ankle, as many as eight games between December and February due to the consequences of a fracture of two lumbar vertebrae and two more games in April due to an adductor problem.