Tuesday, May 11, 2021 at 10:47 PM• Dominic Mostert

Napoli did good business on Tuesday evening in the battle for a Champions League ticket. The team of trainer Gennaro Gattuso recorded a simple 5-1 victory over Udinese and therefore spent the night in second place. A ranking in the top four is sufficient to qualify for the billion dollar ball. The lead on number five Juventus is four points, although the dethroned national champion has played one game less.

Udinese took on Marvin Zeegelaar, who was pulled over fifteen minutes before time. Thomas Ouwejan was allowed to come in nine minutes after the break, while Jayden Braaf and Bram Nuytinck were not fit enough to be part of the match selection. Napoli opened the scoring after 27 minutes, when Udinese goalkeeper Juan Musso parried a shot from Victor Osimhen and rounded Piotr Zielinski in the rebound.

The home team doubled the margin via Fabián Ruiz, who, after preparatory work by Zielinski, found space at the edge of the penalty area for a placed shot in the far top corner. Udinese found the connection five minutes before half-time: Stefano Okaka outsmarted Kostas Manolas and found the bottom corner. Immediately after the break, Hirving Lozano increased the lead again, by anticipating a weak play-in pass from Musso and taking advantage immediately.

Giovanni Di Lorenzo made it 4-1 from a rebound after Musso processed a header from Manolas, and the last goal came from a volley from the edge of the penalty area in the first minute of injury time. It was the biggest victory for the Gattuso team since the 6-0 victory over Fiorentina on January 17. Napoli extended its own unbeaten series to twelve games. I Partenopei will play two more games this season: away against Fiorentina and at home against Hellas Verona.