It is difficult to argue that any player has contributed more to capturing that coveted crown than Nigerian striker Victor Osimhen as Napoli supporters celebrate their first Italian championship victory in 33 years.
Diego Maradona, who managed 16 goals in 28 Serie A games and finished third in the league that year, was the Gli Azzurri’s best scorer in 1990.
Osimhen, whose football team plays in a venue now known as the Maradona venue, has comfortably surpassed that with 22 goals in 27 games, including the crucial goal that sealed the championship in a 1-1 draw with Udinese.
He now has a three-point advantage over Inter Milan’s Lautaro Martinez for the Serie A scoring lead.
He also contributed five Champions League goals, before Napoli were knocked out in the quarter-finals by AC Milan.
Having joined Napoli in July 2020 for a fee of around €81m, a record for an African player, daily transfer rumors now link him with all of Europe’s biggest clubs for even bigger fees.
But is the 24-year-old really worth £100m? Exhibiting deadly accuracy, Osimhen is more of an ice-in-the-veins character. But, just like Maradona, he has taken on the burden of being the team’s figurehead.
Having starred for Nigeria at the Under-17 World Cup in 2015, where he scored 10 goals to help the Super Eagles win a fifth title, the 17-year-old left Lagos-based Ultimate Strikers Academy for German side Wolfsburg, revealing to the BBC at the time that he had turned down an offer from Arsenal.
The move was not greeted with huge fanfare in Germany – and his time in the Bundesliga also failed to hit the right notes as he went 16 games without finding the back of the net.
Osimhen has scored 27 goals in 34 games for club and country this season, catching the eye of Europe’s richest and most powerful teams.
Manchester United, Chelsea, Paris St Germain, Bayern Munich, Atletico Madrid…the list of clubs linked with a move for Osimhen is representative of his success.
