Conte: ‘Fine line between success and failure, but Napoli dream not extinguished’

Antonio Conte and Napoli have regrets after the 1-1 draw at Parma, insisting there is ‘a fine line’ between success and failure, but the Scudetto dream ‘is not extinguished.’

• Read Football Italia Ad-Free and get access to Exclusive News and Content – Free Trial – Click Here

The Partenopei saw this as a precious opportunity to further close on leaders Inter, who face a tricky trip to Como this evening.

However, Parma proved themselves to once again be a big problem for them, as this was the third consecutive Serie A draw between these teams.

Gabriel Strefezza opened the scoring after just 33 seconds, and although Napoli poured forward throughout, they rarely tested Zion Suzuki other than the Scott McTominay equaliser.

Conte frustrated at avoidable Parma goal

“It is so obvious that there’s no need to comment,” Conte told DAZN Italia viewing the goal when Alessandro Buongiorno and Juan Jesus both went for the same long ball.

“We practice these situations over and over again in training, the match situation can be a bit more emotional and the wrong choices are made, but we have worked on this. It’s a pity, because we knew that Parma would sit very deep in the final third, we saw they also put Delprato as a wingback, when usually he’s a defender, so it was more of five at the back.”

Napoli had 74.5 per cent possession and put in 37 crosses, but rarely tested goalkeeper Suzuki.

“I told the lads at the end of the match, there are such fine margins between the team that wins and the team that doesn’t. We should’ve been more focused, instead we conceded that goal after 33 seconds.

“It was already going to be attack against defence anyway, after that goal, they set up the barricades. It was an uphill struggle from the very start, it is not easy to dominate to that degree and then not allow any counter-attacks,” continued Conte.

“We scored, we had chances to win the game, especially with the Elmas header that was incredible. A point here moves us up the table, we know that we need to secure a Champions League spot, the lads gave it their all, but it’s such a fine line between success and a draw.

“It was always going to be a mountain to climb, we tried everything to the very end.”

This result means that Napoli are right now six points off leaders Inter, but so much depends on what happens at the Stadio Sinigaglia this evening.

“The dream is not extinguished, there are still six games for us to play. It was a dream tied exclusively to what those ahead of us do, and looking at Inter’s statistics so far, it was always going to be an audacious dream.

“We will continue doing what we are doing, we won five in a row, played well away to Parma, it’s just a pity we could’ve had an extra two points today. That start was a punch in the face that could’ve been a knockout blow, but we recovered and got this point, now we keep going,” concluded Conte.