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By Alasdair Mackenzie
April 14 (Reuters) – Napoli pushed Juventus back to Serie A and delivered Chievo to relegation with a 3-1 win at Stadio Bentegodi on Sunday.
The Carlo Ancelotti team needed a win to make sure the Turin club, which had lost 2-1 to SPAL on Saturday, would not close out its eighth consecutive league title with a record of six games to spare.
Two goals from Kalidou Koulibaly, on either side of the match, confirmed Chievo's demotion despite Bostjan Cesar's consolation, after a miserable season in which the Verona club recorded only one match. victory in 32 matches.
The result leaves Naples, second, on 67 points, 17 behind Juventus, out of 84.
Juve can secure the title by avoiding the defeat at home against Fiorentina next weekend.
Napoli was in bad shape since the start of the match, having lost his first leg in the quarter-finals of the Europa League against Arsenal 2-0 in London last week because of a draw against Genoa and of a defeat against Empoli in Serie A.
Ancelotti chose a strong team as he was looking to return to conquer the win in the return match between his team at the Premier League team at Stadio San Paolo on Thursday.
"It's always difficult to choose my team and it was also today," said Napoli coach Sky Sports Italia.
"I wanted to use a reliable team that had a lot of character, because against Empoli, I made a lot of changes and we lost something in terms of personality."
Goalkeeper David Ospina has returned for the first time since his hospitalization after being injured in the head during a league match with Udinese on March 17th.
Milik, Lorenzo Insigne and Dries Mertens all started in a training focused on the attack and Ancelotti suggested that he could adopt the same approach for the visit to Arsenal this week.
"It's a possibility," he said. "I have preserved Milik early in the season, but he can do great things that place him among the best strikers in Europe.
"We were surprised by the pressure play of Arsenal because we could not play our way out from behind and were trying to do it rather than trying long balls.
"Their performance in the second half is more like the attitude they will have here in San Paolo, so we'll try the counterattack.
"I chose Insigne and Mertens together because they're both faster than Milik, so I wanted to use their rhythm. I think Thursday the key will be to play a lot of vertical pbades. "
CHIEVO CONSOLATION
Napoli profited from a finishing release when Koulibaly snuck out at the front post to take advantage after 15 minutes.
Milik doubled Napoli's lead with a curling shot in the lower corner of the box, in the middle of the second half, before Koulibaly completed his corset with a weak finish in the last 10 minutes.
Bostjan Cesar headed from the corner to the opposite goal to Chievo for the final act of the match.
Domenico Di Carlo's team has won one game, 11 draws and 20 losses so far this season, but maintains the standings with just 11 points after receiving a three-point deduction for false counts at the start of the campaign. (Report by Alasdair Mackenzie edited by Christian Radnedge)
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