Romelu Lukaku ensured that Napoli would stay three points behind the Serie A-Leaders Inter Milan with a goal and two assists in Monday's 3-0 win over struggling Empoli. Belgium -Spits Lukaku has scored 12 times and this season set up 10 in the top flight of Italy and is the key to Napoli's fight with reigning champions Inter for the competition title. The 31-year-old has developed his game under coach Antonio Conte and has as much impact with his distribution as he is with his goals, with Scott McTominay being the beneficiary on Monday.
McTominay ratte in the other two goals of Napoli, and brought his count to eight in his debut Series A season after he was brilliantly operated by Lukaku, who arrived last summer to replace the banished star Victor Osimhen and exceeded expectations.
“Romelu is clearly a great teammate. He is very demanding, he demands a lot from the entire team, from myself to score more, to create more opportunities for him to score,” McTominay told Dazn.
“He has two assists and one goal, he is clearly a great player with an incredible career and we are so happy with ROM.”
Scotland International McTominay drilled the opener of Napoli home from just outside the area in the 18th minute after Lukaku used his strength and control to keep the ball up and slide into the looting midfielder.
Empoli, who was in second place and did not win in 17 games, was in the game and dangerous until Lukaku doubled the lead of the hosts in the 56th minute, collected the Pas of Mathias Olivera and struck his left foot.
Five minutes later and Lukaku showed a more delicate touch when setting up McTominay for his brace, floating over a perfectly swinging cross that his former teammate of Manchester United went home with confidence.
McTominay almost had a hat trick in the 66th minute when, after he was laid out again by Lukaku, he rolled a low shot against the post when one-on-one with Empoli goalkeeper Devis Vasquez.
Monday's victory keeps the pressure on Inter that opposite Bayern Munich in the second stage of their quarterfinals of the Champions League and then travel to the high-flying Bologna before they are confronted with local Rivals AC Milan in the semi-final of the Italian cup.
In the meantime, Napoli has no other obligations than trying to win a second scudetto in three seasons and confronted with only one team of the top half of the table – 10th placed Torino – between now and the end of the season.
(This story was not edited by DailyExpertNews staff and is automatically generated from a syndicated feed.)
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