S.S.C.Napoli

S.S.C. NAPOLI


Welcome, Napoli supporters from all over the world! This page is dedicated to our fantastic team!

What is S.S.C.Napoli?
A brief history of S.S.C.Napoli
Glory days
"El pibe de oro", Diego Armando Maradona
Last years

What is S.S.C.Napoli?

S.S.C.Napoli is an Italian soccer team and its history is glorious because here played the BEST football player in the world ever, Diego Armando Maradona! His 8 years in Naples will always be remembered in the hearts of the supporters of Napoli!

A brief history of S.S.C.Napoli

S.S.C.Napoli (S.S.C. means Societá Sportiva Calcio) was founded in 1926 and its first years have been not so easy until the ADVENT of Diego Armando Maradona, the best football player in the world ever, in 1984. All the years from the foundation to the advent of Maradona were not so beautiful and Napoli only won twice the Coppa Italia, that is the Italian League Cup, in 1962 and 1976, and reached the Cup Winners' Cup semi-final in 1977. From the advent of "God" Napoli was back to a new life: the tournaments before his arrival were not so great and some times Napoli went very close to relegation to the Serie B. Since 1984 to 1991, thanks to Diego, Napoli was one of the best teams in the world: in 1986 earned a UEFA cup place, ranking third; in 1987, probably the most important season in the history of Napoli, we ranked FIRST in the Serie A, the Italian Championship! Next season, 1987-88, was the best season of the whole history of Napoli, but unfortunately it was not enough to win the tournament again and we ranked as runners-up behind AC Milan, our adventure in European Champions Cup finished in the first round as we lost to Real Madrid 2-0 in Spain and drew in Naples 1-1; 1989 was a very good season too as we won the UEFA cup in Stuttgart, Germany, winning the first match in Naples 2-1 and drawing in the Neckarstadion 3-3, we ranked second in Serie A again as Inter Milan won the championship; 1990 was the year of our revenge against AC Milan which had won in 1988 the championship in the last matches: after a beautiful head-to-head we won our second Scudetto! 1991 was not a good season, as we went out of the first places in Serie A and in European Champions' Cup we were defeated on the penalties shoot-out in Moscow against Spartak Moscow as we drew in Naples and in Russia 0-0. 1991 was the year in which Diego was found "positive" and he was disqualified for more than a year. Diego Maradona's history in Naples came to an end and Napoli's one too as in the last few years the team has not been able to win anything. We reached twice a UEFA cup place, but unfortunately our adventure did not last too much as we were defeated by Paris St.Germain and Eintracht Frankfurt.
Until today Napoli has won:
2 Italian Championships (1986-87, 1989-90)
3 Coppa Italia (1961-62, 1975-76, 1986-87)
1 Supercoppa Italiana (1990-91)
1 UEFA Cup (1988-89)

Glory days

A beautiful song by Bruce Springsteen says "Glory days, well they'll pass you by glory days..."! One thing is sure: Napoli's glory days were really GLORY DAYS! From 1984 to 1991 our team was an unbeatable team! Diego Maradona, his superb skill, his left foot were all some ingredients for a great team! The advent of Diego in Naples was really difficult and it lasted all the summer in 1984 and everybody here in Naples followed with great attention the difficulties Napoli met to buy Diego from Barcelona: at last Napoli did buy Diego and here in Naples 60000 and even more people went to the San Paolo stadium to see the presentation of the new idol to the Neapolitan supporters! What some incredible moments! The first two seasons (1984-85 and 1985-86) were quite good, but not excellent and people expected the first victory of the Scudetto. It was the season after, 1986-87, when Napoli won the title! A tournament where Napoli deserved to win as it was almost always in the lead: this is the UNFORGETTABLE season for the supporters of Napoli, as we also won the Coppa Italia defeating Atalanta in the final winning all the 13 matches in the competition! Diego Maradona, Bruno Giordano, Salvatore Bagni, Moreno Ferrario, Claudio Garella, Andrea Carnevale (who scored the goal which gave Napoli the victory of the championship on 10th May 1987, Napoli-Fiorentina 1-1) are in the heart of all the Neapolitans. Here in Naples people are really huge fans of Napoli and as our team won the championship all the city of Naples was a BIG PARTY! On the streets, in the houses, all night long and days to come there was a sort of a "Carnival of Naples"! Unforgettable moments... The season after, 1987-88, is the season every fan wants to forget as Napoli played a fantastic tournament until 8 matches from the end, but some problems in the team among the players began to incide on the results of Napoli and we lost our championship even though we were 5 points above the second just few matches from the end: we lost to AC Milan, where Ruud Gullit, Marco Van Basten, Frank Rijkaard played a great match here in Naples as they won against Napoli 3-2 two weeks from the end of the tournament; in 1988-89 Inter Milan was really unstoppable as they earned more points than any team had ever done in a Serie A, Napoli ranked second again; but in 1988-89 we won our UEFA Cup, going through defeating PAOK (1-0, 1-1), Lokomotiv Leipzig (1-1, 2-0), Bordeaux (1-0, 0-0), Juventus Turin (0-2, 3-0 a.e.t.- goal by Renica on the 119th minute with a header- simply unbelievable), Bayern Munich (2-0, 2-2) and Stuttgart (2-1, 3-3). A memorable cup won thanks to Diego Maradona, thanks to the great Brazilian striker Antonio Careca, Ricardo Alemao...; in 1989-90 there was the victory of our second title! We played a great championship at home making 33 on 34 points (16 victories, 1 draw, 0 defeats) and our head-to-head against AC Milan until the last week is unforgettable: both teams had the same points two weeks before the end and Napoli won in Bologna 2-4 when AC Milan lost to the relegated Verona 2-1 after an incredible match. Last week Napoli deserved to win against Lazio and a header by Marco Baroni scored the 1-0 which allowed us to win the title! Glory days stopped in Moscow, as Napoli lost on penalties against Spartak Moscow in the second round of Champions' Cup, after going through defeating the Hungarian team of Ujpest Dozsa (3-0, 2-0). Since then such years did not come back anymore! Let's hope for the future!

"El pibe de oro", Diego Armando Maradona


If there is a player who is the symbol of S.S.C.Napoli, this is of course Diego Armando Maradona, the best player of the world ever! Since his arrival in Naples everybody began to love him like a son, because he was able to give the city of Naples a worldwide renown taking our team to the top of European football. His first season, 1984-85, was not a great season, but in the second part of the championship he showed his class scoring an memorable hattrick against Lazio as Napoli won 4-0 and Diego scored one goal directly from the corner kick and another one with an unbelievable lob from outside the penalty area! The season after, 1985-86, Diego scored the goal which gave us the first victory against Juventus Turin after many years (1-0 with a free-kick); he missed the penalty in Toulouse as Napoli went out from the UEFA Cup, but in Serie A 1986-87 he showed all his class taking our team to the victory (two unforgettable goals are the one against Sampdoria as he scored with a diving header very close to the grass and another one as he "drank" all the AC Milan defenders when Napoli won 2-1): he was coming back from the World Cup of 1986 in Mexico when he led Argentina to the final victory scoring the famous goal with the "hand of god" against England, but scoring another one dribbling 6 players scoring probably the most beautiful goal in the history of football!; the idol of Naples was the author of such some victories as he led our team to the victory of the UEFA Cup in 1988-89; in 1989-90 his extraordinary goals and assists allowed us to win our second Scudetto; the history of Diego Maradona in Naples came to an end in 1991, when he was disqualified as he was "positive" after the match Napoli-Bari. Diego had to go away from Naples and he didn't come back here anymore. He went to Spain where he played for Sevilla, but his adventure was not so lucky, then he began to concentrate on the USA World Cup of 1994 and he, 34 years old, began to play a great tournament scoring a goal against Greece but some "ephedrine" was found and he was then disqualified by FIFA so that he couldn't finish his tournament and Argentina was defeated by Romania. Before his retirement of 1997, he had played for Boca Juniors in Argentina, but here in Naples everybody is waiting for him to come back, to greet all his fans, to play a friendly match in the city that loved him more than every other one in the world, that is waiting for him ...someday....

Last years

Unfortunately, last years, from 1991 to 1999, were not so beautiful for Napoli as we never ranked in the top positions. In 1992 we ranked fourth and qualified for the UEFA Cup, but our dreams vanished with the Paris St.Germain, though we had beaten Valencia 6-1 on aggregate (1-5 in Spain) with 6 goals by the Uruguayan striker Daniel Fonseca. The year after we did not qualify for the UEFA Cup as the team played an anonymous tournament. In 1994 we qualified for the UEFA Cup in the last match winning 0-1 in Foggia with a goal by Paolo Di Canio, now a star of English football, who led us to the seventh place; in 1995 we lost the UEFA Cup place in the last minute of the last match since Inter Milan won 2-1 against Padova; 1995-96 was a poor season as Napoli scored less goals than every team in the league, but ranked tenth, and our goalkeeper Taglialatela saved our team from relegation ranking as the best goalkeeper of the Serie A.
In 1996/97 Napoli avoided relegation on the last day but one, and reached the Italian Cup final. But the following season, 1997/98, has been terrible for us as Napoli was relegated in Serie B after 33 consecutive years in the top division and after Maradona's magic years.
1998/99 also was a disaster because we missed the promotion and played a very bad tournament in the Serie B.
But fortunately last season 1999/2000 we were promoted again to Serie A! There was a big party in Naples.
Who knows how the future will be? Today's football requires a lot of money, and Napoli does not have enough to create a very competitive team. Fortunately we just got the promotion back to Serie A, and somehow maybe we will get back to the top places, waiting for another Diego Armando Maradona...

For any suggestions please send comments to Mario Giaquinto

Back to Maradona in Naples
Back to A tribute to Maradona