Serie A · 1984
Maradona's Napoli did not happen overnight
Eighty thousand people turned up to watch him be introduced. Two games into the season Napoli had one point, and Diego Maradona's first Serie A goal had come from the penalty spot.
The welcome came first. Napoli signed Diego Maradona from Barcelona on 5 July 1984, and 80,000 people went to the San Paolo just to see him presented. The club he joined had finished 11th in a 16-team league the season before, a point above relegation.
What followed on the pitch was slower.
Verona
Maradona's Serie A debut, on 16 September at Verona, ended in a 3–1 defeat. Hans-Peter Briegel headed the first, Giuseppe Calderisi scored the second three minutes later, and Antonio Di Gennaro added another header. Daniel Bertoni's volley was all Napoli had to show. Nobody knew it yet, but Verona would win the league that season.
Maradona said later that Italian football "was played at a different rhythm, and the football was rougher." That first game at the Bentegodi was an early lesson in both.
Sampdoria
The second game, on 23 September, was his first league match at the San Paolo. Sampdoria came to Naples, and for an hour Napoli could not find a way through.
In the 62nd minute they won a penalty. Maradona took it and scored: his first goal in Serie A. Ten minutes later Fausto Salsano equalised for Sampdoria, and it finished 1–1.
After two matches, the man 80,000 people had turned out to welcome had one goal, and his team had one point.
A season of two halves
Rino Marchesi's Napoli did not suddenly become a great team. The early rounds brought more defeats and draws. The improvement came later in the season, when the wins began to arrive more regularly. Napoli finished eighth, and Maradona ended his first season with 14 league goals.
It was enough to show that the club was going somewhere. It was not a transformation. That took longer, and it needed more than one player. Napoli won the league in 1989–90, two points ahead of Milan.
Why the draw matters
It is tempting to tell Maradona's Naples story as if the city's fortunes changed the day he arrived. The penalty against Sampdoria is a useful corrective. His first Serie A goal came from 12 yards, in a draw, a week after a defeat, in a season that ended in eighth place.
The goals kept coming after that. The penalty against Sampdoria was the first of 81 he scored for Napoli in Serie A.