Napoli’s title decider pushed back to Sunday

Napoli’s potential Italian title decider with Salernitana has been pushed back to Sunday after officials in Naples demanded the match be moved for reasons of public order.

Southern Italy’s biggest club will be crowned champions for the first time since 1990 with six matches remaining this weekend with a win over Salernitana in Naples, if second-placed Lazio fail to beat Inter Milan.

Napoli’s match had originally been scheduled to be the opening match of this weekend’s fixtures at 1300 GMT on Saturday but a source told AFP that it will now be played at the same time on Sunday, after Lazio play the day’s first match.

The official announcement from the league was due to be on Thursday but will now be made on Friday following delays in written communications from Naples authorities.

Wild partying was expected in tourist hotspot Naples on Saturday in anticipation of Lazio’s match with Inter, raising security concerns.

Earlier on Thursday Naples prefect Claudio Palomba said the match would be pushed back a day as “the need arose to avoid events overlapping in order to help the police”.

A major comic book convention is being staged in Naples on Saturday which will also draw legions of fans to the city.

“Had we kept the match on Saturday we would have had to double our resources and for that reason we have adopted a number of measures,” Palomba added.

Italian media report that Napoli’s following match, at Udinese, will also be moved from Tuesday May 2 to Thursday May 4.

Napoli need a maximum of five points to secure the title so that game could end up being the decisive fixture in a long-awaited title win.