Napoli Must Resist The Urge To Sell Its Two Biggest Stars

Napoli’s long-awaited Scudetto is surely just a matter of time, just a matter of getting through the next few games unscathed. Their lead is so massive, so gargantuan, that it would take a collapse of monumental and unseen proportions for them not to win Serie A for the first time since Diego Maradona was still a player, 33 years ago.

Napoli are 19 points clear of second-place Lazio and Serie A are could be on the verge of reaching the Champions League final. They are in the favourable side of the draw and face Milan in the quarter final – their first – in the next couple of weeks. See off Milan and a semi final against one of Benfica or Inter await. Luciano Spalletti’s side are more than capable of beating them both, and a truly historic double could be in the offing.

Propelled by the sublime talents of Victor Osimhen and Khvicha Kvaratskhelia, much of the talk surrounding the pair is can Napoli hold on to their star duo. Make no mistake about it, this Napoli team isn’t just those two, but Osimhen and Kvaratskhelia lift the team from very good to brilliant.

Osimhen’s raw potential has been evident since he arrived at Napoli in the summer of 2020. There is no one quite like him in the league, that mixture of physicality, pace and heading ability, he simply terrifies defenders when in one vs one situations. If a defender finds himself in a foot race against the Nigerian, it’s game over. Even on a Vespa it would be difficult to catch the striker.

Osimhen is currently sitting atop the Capocannoniere charts with 21 goals in Serie A, and at his current rate is likely to hit 30 before the end of the season. Moreover, Osimhen is only three goals away from equalling George Weah’s 46 Serie A goals for Milan in the late 1990s, and becoming the most prolific African ever to play in Italy.

Given the current state of the market, it’s not surprising that according to La Gazzetta dello Sport, Napoli president Aurelio De Laurentiis is demanding around €150m ($161m) for any team that wants to take the 24-year-old away from Naples.

Kvaratskhelia, meanwhile, has turned Serie A on its head since his low-key arrival last summer. It’s been years since a player has literally come out of nothing to surprise the football audience, and the Georgian has done just that. His valuation is already in the triple digits of millions, with PSG reportedly ready to put down $171m to bring him to the French capital next season.

De Laurentiis, a man who runs a very tight financial ship, with Napoli one of the few teams in the league to be in the black and not red, must resist the urge to sell either of his stars. There is a real possibility for the club to open up something of a mini dynasty, with all of the traditional ‘big three’ of Juventus, Milan and Inter all in constant state of flux and mired in debt, Napoli could win two or three consecutive Scudetti, writing their name in the club’s history books as perhaps its greatest team, certainly on a par with the legendary Maradona sides of the late ‘80s.

The fear is that after this season, the team will be broke apart. We’ve seen it happen to Monaco (twice) and Ajax over recent years, and the hope is that this team can be kept together this summer and make a real tilt at the Champions League next season. That is granted they don’t win it this season.

With nearly €80m ($86m) earned from their Champions League run already, Napoli could and should offer both Osimhen and Kvaratskhelia new contracts to keep them happy and content in southern Italy. And should they do, there’s no telling what further success lies ahead for Napoli.