August 16, (THEWILL) –Â Napoli’s 2022/2023 Serie A season opened with a commanding defeat of Hellas Verona 5-2 at home for the team’s first victory in the league with Victor Osimhen already getting a goal and an assist to his name.
The visitors were more assertive in possession and controlled the movement in the early exchanges but, against the run of play Koray Günter’s header put the ball in Kevin Lasagna’s path, who evaded Mário Rui’s marking and scored the opener for the home team.
Hirving Lozano sparked Napoli’s response, and their recent summer signing Khvicha Kvaratskhelia headed the ball into the goal to equalize. Before the end of the first half, Osimhen widened the lead for the visitors with a typical poacher’s goal. Thomas Henry scored an equalizer off a feed from Marco Davide Faraoni, but Napoli moved ahead again thanks to Piotr Zielinski’s goal off a clever pass from Kvaratskhelia, who recorded his first Serie A assist.
Stanislav Lobotka was able to move the ball forward and find a shooting opportunity because the Verona defence was not paying attention. As Napoli’s fifth scorer for the night, Matteo Politano added further misery for Verona after coming off the bench.
Verona were challenging initially but could not prevent the beating when the goals began to pour in. Hopefully against Bologna on Sunday, they can find a win. On that same day, Napoli take on Monza at home.
Jude Obafemi is a versatile senior Correspondent at THEWILL Newspapers, excelling in sourcing, researching, and delivering sports news stories for both print and digital publications.
