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SPORTSFriday 15 January 2016
Spanish Preview: Italian Preview:
Napoli coach taking a pragmatic
Zidane looks to keep Real Madrid on a roll approach to teams’ Serie A lead
TALES AZZONI point, Madrid is third with best defense in the league ANDREW DAMPF
AP Sports Writer 40 points, two less than Bar- — Barcelona and Malaga AP Sports Writer
MADRID (AP) — Zinedine celona and four less than come next with 15 goals ROME (AP) — Diego Maradona has already prom-
Zidane gets a chance Atletico Madrid. each. ised that he will make a splashy arrival by helicopter
to keep Real Madrid’s Zidane has had a full week Atletico has scored 27 times if Napoli wins its first Serie A title in more than a quar-
momentum going in a to train the squad and try — Real Madrid has 52 goals ter of a century.
home game against strug- to reinforce his playing and Barcelona 44 — but it’s Napoli coach Maurizio Sarri is taking a more prag-
gling Sporting Gijon in the style, which is based on try- been enough to keep the matic approach after the southern club claimed Se-
Spanish league this week- ing to retain ball possession wins coming. Atletico leads rie A’s symbolic “winter title” last weekend.
end. and avoid long ball transi- the league with 14 victo- “I don’t attribute any importance to it,” Sarri said of
After routing Deportivo tions from the defense to ries, one more than Bar- Napoli’s two-point lead over four-time defending
La Coruna 5-0 at the San- the attack. celona. Real Madrid and champion Juventus and Inter Milan after 19 of 38
tiago Bernabeu Stadium The only bad news for the fourth-place Villarreal each rounds in Serie A.
in Zidane’s debut as head former France great going won 12 times in 19 rounds. The halfway champion has gone on to win Serie A
coach on Saturday, Ma- into Sunday’s match at the “We’ve been improving nearly seven out of every 10 seasons.
The last time Napoli earned the mid-term honor was
Real Madrid’s new head coach Zinedine Zidane gives instructions from the side line during a in 1990, when the team went on to claim its last title.
Spanish La Liga soccer match between Real Madrid and Deportivo Coruna at the Santiago Ber- Maradona was the star of the 1990 team and also
nabeu stadium in Madrid, Saturday, Jan. 9, 2016. Zidane gets a chance to keep Real Madrid’s helped Napoli to the title in 1987 — the club’s only
momentum going in a home game against struggling Sporting Gijon in the Spanish league this two Serie A championships.
weekend. “It’s useless to look at statistics from the past,” Sarri
added. “We’ve got to imagine ourselves like mar-
(AP Photo/Francisco Seco) athon runners. We’ve reached the race’s halfway
point but we’ve still got 21 kilometers (13 miles) to
drid plays an opponent Bernabeu is that captain game after game,” Sime- go.” The next test comes Saturday against a Sas-
that has lost seven of its last Sergio Ramos is nursing a one said. suolo lineup that is in sixth place and beat Inter 1-0
eight games, including the lingering shoulder injury last weekend.
last four. Sporting hasn’t that forced him to be sub- FULL-STRENGTH BARCELO- Inter can put pressure on Napoli with a win at Ata-
won a match since early stituted at halftime against NA lanta earlier Saturday, while Juventus will be seeking
December and is only 18th Deportivo last Saturday. After resting some players its 10th consecutive win at Udinese on Sunday.
in the 20-team standings. Here are other things to in the 2-0 win over Espan- Fourth-place Fiorentina, which is three points back,
It has a game in hand, know about the 20th round: yol in the Copa del Rey on visits struggling AC Milan on Sunday.
but it’s against Barcelona. Wednesday, coach Luis Fifth-place Roma, which fired Rudi Garcia on
To make things worse, the ATLETICO’S DOMINANCE Enrique is expected to field Wednesday, hosts last-place Hellas Verona.
team just found out that Atletico Madrid, which the team’s regular start- Also this weekend, it’s: Torino vs. Frosinone; Genoa
it will be without defend- plays at 16th-place Las ers when Barcelona hosts vs. Palermo; Bologna vs. Lazio; Carpi vs. Sampdoria;
er Bernardo Espinosa for Palmas on Sunday, is the eighth-place Athletic Bil- and Chievo Verona vs. Empoli.
about seven months be- hottest team in the Span- bao on Sunday. Here are a few things to know about Serie A enter-
cause of a knee injury sus- ish league with eight wins in Enrique rested striker Ney- ing this weekend’s matches:
tained last weekend. its last nine games. Its only mar and defender Gerard
Madrid, meanwhile, is setback was a 1-0 loss at Pique against Espanyol, but GONZALO’S GOALS
boosted by the arrival of Malaga four rounds ago. the duo is expected to be Nobody in Europe’s top leagues is scoring at a faster
Zidane, who breathed new Diego Simeone’s team back in the squad against rate than Napoli’s Gonzalo Higuain.
life into the Spanish giant continues to rely on solid Athletic. Luis Suarez, who The Argentine player has 18 goals in 19 Serie A
after it struggled under defense to stay on top. At- didn’t play Wednesday matches — 20 in 23 appearances in all competitions
coach Rafa Benitez. letico has conceded eight because of a suspension — for a rate of one goal every 89 minutes.
Another victory under the goals in 19 matches, and for insulting opponents in In Europe, only Alex Texeira at Shakhtar Donetsk (22
command of the former the only time it conceded the first leg against the city goals) and Nemanja Nikolic at Legia Warsaw (21
player will keep fans sat- more than one goal in a rival, also is set to return. goals) have scored more than Higuain this season,
isfied and can move the game was in a 2-1 home Neymar and Suarez are the while Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang at Borussia Dort-
team closer to the top of defeat to Barcelona in the league’s leading scorers mund also has 18 goals.
the table. At the halfway third round. It’s by far the with 15 goals each.q Lionel Messi only has nine goals in the Spanish league
while Cristiano Ronaldo has 14.
ROMA REVIVAL?
With Luciano Spalletti widely expected to be named
as the replacement for the fired Rudi Garcia, Roma
is hoping the squad can rediscover the form that
made it an early season title contender.
With only one win in its last seven Serie A matches,
Roma has dropped to fifth place, seven points be-
hind leader Napoli.
Roma never really recovered psychologically from
a 6-1 rout by Barcelona in the Champions League in
November. Spalletti coached Roma from 2005-09,
winning two Italian Cups and an Italian Super Cup -
the Giallorossi’s last titles of any kind. He then spent
five years with Zenit St. Petersburg before being fired
in March 2014. q