Napoli lose momentum against lowly Catania

Nov 7, 2009, 18:00 GMT

Rome - Napoli only took home a scoreless draw from an away game to struggling Catania Saturday in the opening game of the Serie A weekend.

The side from Naples moved on to 18 points from 12 games and lie now tied for fifth with Fiorentina, which is set to visit Udinese on Sunday. Meanwhile, Catania remained in the drop zone on eight points.

Napoli last weekend celebrated a historic 3-2 win, coming from behind at Juventus, but seemed to have lost their impressive grit as they tackled the Sicilian side.

Their showing disappointed the fans after the three wins and one draw clinched since Walter Mazzarri took over as coach from Roberto Donadoni.

The Sicily hosts had a first good chance on four minutes as Japanese froward Takayuki Morimoto missed by a hair's breadth from close range, despite the close tackle from Gianluca Grava.

Giuseppe Mascara squandered a more inviting opportunity for Catania on 11 minutes when the captain's header from a few metres off bounced on the ground and flew above the bar.

Catania's ball possession failed to bring goals as Alessandro Potenza had a feeble header saved on 18 minutes. Then, at 42 Mascara set up Morimoto in the area only to see the Japanese fire onto goalkeeper Morgan De Sanctis.

A missed deflection and a wide header from the lacklustre Morimoto opened the second half, but Ezequiel Lavezzi squandered Napoli's only chance, hitting Uruguay's Mariano Andujar, rather than attempting an angled shot.

Catania seemed to lose steam after the break, but still came close on 61 minutes as Argentine Cristian Llama saw his firm shot deflected by De Sanctis, who two minutes later had to leave the area to stop a break from Morimoto with a header.

In later action, Juventus visit Atalanta looking to reduce their seven-point gap from leaders Inter Milan.

The front-runners have 28 points ahead of a home game to Roma on Sunday, when joint-second Sampdoria visit Cagliari and fourth-place AC Milan play at Lazio.