Napoli beats Cagliari only on penalties: they’re in the Coppa Italia quarterfinals

After the victories of Juventus and Atalanta against Udinese and Genoa respectively, Napoli also respected the prediction in the round of 16 of the Coppa Italia. But Antonio Conte’s men struggled much more than expected to get the better of a never tame Cagliari. At the Maradona, in fact, it ended 1-1 after regulation time: Lucca opened the scoring for the Azzurri, the newly entered Esposito equalized in the second half. So it goes to penalty kicks where after an’interminable sequence is Buongiorno to give the partenopei the qualification to the quarterfinals where they will challenge one between Fiorentina and Como.

Luca Giorgetti

Naples found the lead on the first shot on goal: Vergara’s corner kick to the second post where there’s Lucca who with his head smashed the ball into the net, beating Caprile. Five minutes later it was the same blue striker who came close to doubling the score with a shot that ended up on the outside of the net but at the time of the conclusion he was offside. In the final, the guests tried to make themselves dangerous with a shot by Di Pardo from the edge of the area but his attempt ended up far outside the mirror.

At the beginning of the second half, Politano tried on Lucca’s bank but the blue outfielder’s shot ended high over the crossbar. At 55′ Pisacane sends Prati, Borrelli and Sebastiano Esposito on the field and the choice turns out to be apt. First Prati, with a shot deflected by Vergara, and then Esposito, with a high right, scare Milinkovic-Savic. At 67′ it was the same Esposito who signed the Red and Blue equaliser by finalizing a counter-attack led by Borrelli. At the’83’ Cagliari even came close to overtaking with a Deiola header just high. In the final, Caprile overcame first on McTominay and then on Neres. Thus it goes to penalty kicks.

In the penalty lottery, the first to miss is Felici: his shot is printed on the crossbar. Napoli has match point with Neres but the Brazilian outfielder gets hypnotized by Caprile. It goes on to the bitter end until the tenth penalty shot: Luvumbo

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