Napoli have used the same number of players as Juventus this season, but their rotation options have played far fewer minutes.
The Partenopei are six points behind the reigning champions heading in to tonight’s fixtures, and have won only two of their last six Serie A games.
Many have blamed that on Maurizio Sarri’s lack of rotation, charging the Coach with tiring out his squad.
Napoli have used the same number of players as Juventus this season, but their rotation options have played far fewer minutes.
The Partenopei are six points behind the reigning champions heading in to tonight’s fixtures, and have won only two of their last six Serie A games.
Many have blamed that on Maurizio Sarri’s lack of rotation, charging the Coach with tiring out his squad.
In terms of pure numbers, Napoli have used the same number of players as Juventus this season, 23, with only the two Milan clubs have used fewer with 22. Benevento have used 38 players this season.
However, in terms of minutes played it appears that the charges against Sarri do carry some weight.
Gonzalo Higuain has played the most minutes for Juve this season with with 2,334, followed by Giorgio Chiellini on 2,152 and Miralem Pjanic on 2,139.
No fewer that seven Napoli players have played more minutes than Higuain, with Jorginho eighth for the Partenopei on 2,295 – more than both Chiellini and Pjanic.
Indeed Pepe Reina, Kalidou Koulibaly, Jose Callejon and Dries Mertens have all played over 2,700 minutes.
Emanuele Giaccherini, who has now joined Chievo, has the fewest minutes for Napoli this season with 60, with winger Adam Ounas managing just 87.
The Juventus player with the fewest minutes is Benedikt Howedes with 158, though the German’s season has been blighted by injury.
Ahead of him are Rodrigo Bentancur on 477 minutes, Stefano Sturaro on 502 and Claudio Marchisio on 575.
Nikola Maksimovic, Luigi Sepe and Ounas – who are 20th to 22nd in Napoli’s rankings – have played 95, 90 and 87 minutes respectively.
In total 10 Napoli players have played over 2000 minutes, while eight of those used have played less than 500.
Only Howedes and Bentancur have played fewer than 500 minutes for Juventus, and only four – Higuain, Chiellini, Pjanic and Mario Mandzukic – have been on the pitch for over 2000 Serie A minutes.
That is reflected in the fact that the 11 Napoli players to have spent the longest on the pitch have played an average of 2,437 minutes.
For the Bianconeri that figure is 1,865, with 17 of their 23 players used having amassed over 1,000 minutes.
By contrast, just 12 of the Partenopei’s 23 have managed the same feat.
With Napoli travelling to Turin on Sunday night to face Juventus, will Sarri rest players against Udinese tonight?