Napoli still pointless after 3-1 loss at Villarreal as Allegri criticizes team, De Bruyne
Napoli lost their second Champions League game. Coach Massimiliano Allegri criticized his team's defending and spoke openly about a misunderstanding with Kevin De Bruyne.
Archive image · Photo: Raquel Guerra / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0 (cropped and resized)
Napoli are without a point after two Champions League games. Napoli took the lead at Villarreal through Amir Rrahmani in the eighth minute, but Georges Mikautadze, after a short back pass, and Santiago Mouriño, with a long-range shot, turned the game around in the 23rd and 26th minutes. Tani Oluwaseyi made it 3-1 in the 86th. It was Villarreal's first win of this Champions League campaign.
"You can lose games, but not like this," Allegri said. "We lacked patience and didn't keep the ball." Knowing how to defend, he said, "has become almost something to be ashamed of."
Allegri also spoke about Kevin De Bruyne. "At one point I asked him to drop back and push McTominay further forward," he said, "but we didn't understand each other." According to Football Italia, De Bruyne had said after a 3-0 win over Frosinone that he was not a fan of the deep playmaker role. It was Napoli's third straight Champions League defeat.