Napoli Champions League bid ends with quarterfinal loss to Milan

Napoli players applaud the crowd after drawing 1-1 with Milan to lose 2-1 on aggregate in a UEFA Champions League quarterfinal match at the Diego-Maradona stadium in Naples on Tuesday. [AFP/YONHAP]

Napoli crashed out of the UEFA Champions League quarterfinals on Tuesday, drawing 1-1 with Milan at home to lose 2-1 on aggregate and end the Partenopei’s greatest European run ever.

It was a painful loss for the Naples side, especially coming at the hands of a fellow Serie A side, a league that Napoli have completely dominated this season and currently lead by 14 points.

It was a first half goal from Olivier Giroud that gave Milan the edge, with Victor Osimhen finally breaking through to equalize three minutes into stoppage time at the end of the game. By that point it was already too little, too late — Milan had held off the all-out Napoli offensive for 93 minutes and there was no time left on the clock to turn things around.

Korean center back Kim Min-jae, normally the backbone of the Napoli defense, was forced to miss the game after accumulating too many yellow cards.

Speaking after the game, Napoli manager Luciano Spalletti admitted inexperience played a role in the result.

"We congratulate Milan for this qualification, that must be done because they have played two games managing to capitalise to the maximum [on their opportunities],” Spalletti said in a post-match interview. This is a sign of a mature team, of players who know how to choose the moments: when to step on the accelerator and when you have to defend yourself with all the team.

"But I also want to congratulate my players. We played a Champions League campaign of the highest level and we played a good match tonight as well.

"We paid for a little inexperience in reading the moments of the match. We played with different players with a little tiredness, starting with Osimhen who had not played for twenty days."

With the win, Milan advance to the semifinals where they will face either Benfica or local rivals Inter Milan. On the other side of the bracket, Real Madrid knocked out Chelsea on Tuesday and will face either Bayern Munich or Manchester City in the semis.

For Napoli, Tuesday’s game marks three consecutive games without a win across all competitions — two of them at the hands of Milan — a worrying sign for a team that had gone lossless for the majority of last year. Napoli have now won just one game in their last five, having faced Milan three times during that period.

Napoli, considered one of the best teams in Europe this season, lead Serie A with 24 wins, three draws and three losses.

But cracks are starting to show in the Napoli machine. Two of those three league losses came in the last month and a half — 4-0 to AC Milan on April 2 and 1-0 to Lazio on March 3 — while a draw against Verona over the weekend was the club’s first since August last year.

Milan in particular appear to have cracked the Napoli code. The northern Italy club beat Napoli 4-0 in Naples on April 2 in a league game, then beat them 1-0 in Milan in the Champions League last week, before drawing 1-1 on Tuesday. Their other league game this season was a 2-1 win for Napoli back in September last year.

If the issue is Milan alone, it is unlikely to upset Napoli’s bid to win their first Serie A title in more than 20 years.

Napoli currently lead Serie A on 75 points, with Lazio in second on 61, Roma third on 56 and Milan in fourth on 53. None of those clubs look likely to catch up with the Partenopei with eight games still remaining, although the draw against 18th-place Verona last week suggests that there could be bigger issues at play for the league leaders.

With their Champions League bid now over and the chance of contesting for the Coppa Italia ended months ago, Napoli can now focus solely on securing that Serie A victory for the final two months of the season.

Napoli will be back in action on Sunday as they face Juventus on the road.

BY JIM BULLEY [jim.bulley@joongang.co.kr]