Sarri compares current and old Napoli sides to blondes and brunettes

Maurizio Sarri led his side to a solid win over Napoli at the weekend. photo credit: Gribaudi/ImagePhoto

SERIE A Sarri compares current and old Napoli sides to blondes and brunettes

Ayoola Kelechi 17:17 - 04.03.2023

Maurizio Sarri's analogy to explain differences between the current Napoli and his Napoli side have raised some eyebrows

Lazio head coach Maurizio Sarri has compared the current Napoli side under Luciano Spalletti and the Napoli side that he coached between 2015 and 2018, saying it would be unfair to place the two teams side by side. 

Sarri’s blonde and brunette analogy

Sarri was head coach of Napoli for three years before joining Lazio via short stints at Chelsea and Juventus and is revered in Italy for the work he did with I Partinopei as manager. 

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Sarri came close to winning the Scudetto with Napoli in his final season at the club, and his Napoli team had only two points fewer than Napoli currently do at this stage of that season, but he refused to be drawn on comparisons between the two sides, instead choosing an odd analogy to differentiate between the two Napoli teams. 

After Sarri’s current team, Lazio, handed Napoli their first loss in Serie A since early January, the 64-year-old manager was asked if his Napoli team was the “great beauty” compared to Spalletti’s Napoli, to which he replied, “You can have many beauties. If you prefer blondes, it’s not as if a pretty brunette walks past and you call her ugly.”

‘The difference is that this Napoli is going to win’ — Sarri 

He then noted that the major difference between the two sides would come down to what this current Napoli team will be able to achieve at the end of the season, which his team could not. 

“The difference between the teams is that this Napoli is going to win and for that, I envy them like crazy!” He added. 

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He also congratulated his descendant Spalletti, as well as the Club’s upper echelons, on his great work with the team, saying, “Spalletti has been phenomenal, along with the club and director of sport, he had the courage to do things that had never been done before.”

Despite the setback of Friday’s loss to Lazio, Napoli remain ahead of the chasing pack in Serie A and have a 17-point lead over their nearest rivals on the table. 

They are champions-elect and it would see a collapse of epic proportions for them to lose out on end-of-the-season celebrations. 

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