Napoli pay perfect tribute to Maradona

Italian club beats Lazio 4-0 to move three points clear at the top of Serie A

MILAN:

Dazzling Napoli paid the perfect tribute to Diego Maradona on Sunday by thumping Lazio 4-0 to move three points clear at the top of Serie A.

FIFA president Gianni Infantino was among those present in Naples as the southern Italian city honoured one of its adopted sons, who led Napoli to their only two league titles and the 1989 UEFA Cup and died a year ago on Thursday.

Fans chanted Maradona's name as a statue, which depicts their idol in full flight atop the number 10, was carried around the pitch.

A tribute from Pele was shown on the stadium's big screens, while players came out for their pre-match warm-up to the sound of "Life Is Life" by Opus, the song to which Maradona does keepie-uppies in one of the most beloved pieces of footage of the Argentine in his pomp.

Inspired by the emotional ceremony, Napoli took full advantage of AC Milan crashing to a 3-1 home defeat against Sassuolo to go it alone at the summit with an at times electrifying performance.

"We put in one of our best performances, now the important thing is to always play like that, because you need to repeat those kinds of displays. The way we played today was perfect," Dries Mertens told DAZN, after scoring a superb double.

Wearing shirts bearing Maradona's face, Luciano Spalletti's table toppers came out like a team possessed and blew Lazio away with three fantastic first-half goals.

In almost perfect harmony with the occasion it was another adopted Neapolitan in Mertens who led the charge, the Belgian nicknamed 'Ciro' scoring a brilliant brace of which Maradona himself would have been proud.

Piotr Zielinski got the ball rolling in the seventh minute by almost ripping a hole in the net with his rocket opener, and just three minutes later Mertens took the roof off the Stadio Diego Armando Maradona when he ended a brilliant move by dumping Patric on the deck with a feint and slotting home a cool finish.