Napoli were unable to secure passage into the Europa League final after losing to Dnipro 1-0 in the second leg of their semi-final in Ukraine on Thursday night.
The Ukranian outfit held a slender away goal lead after leaving the Stadio San Paolo with a 1-1 draw, and managed to score the winning goal in the second half thanks to a Yevhen Seleznyov header, much to the Neapolitan’s dismay.
Both sides immediately looked to state their intent after bright attacking play led to free kicks being conceded at either end of the pitch.
Gonzalo Higuain could have opened the scoring as early as the second minute from the aforementioned set piece, only to send his pacey header over the bar. Dnipro then received their own attempt with Yevhen Konoplyanka stepping up for the kick, though his driven shot was comfortably saved.
Some good passing then led Gokhan Inler to pick out Higuain as the Swiss midfield sent in a delightful ball which cut the Dnipro defence, freeing the big Argentine into a one on one situation with Denys Boyko, though the later came out on top with a magnificent short range parry.
An inspired Boyko proved hard to beat as Napoli continued to press towards goal, with the Ukranian goalkeeper producing a heroic diving save as he once again denied Higuain, this time from a goal bound header as the Napoli forward made contact with a great cross from Faouzi Ghoulam.
The goalkeeper continued to clear any danger thrown at him, enabling his to remain comfortable in the game, and the hosts almost managed to capitalise on the Italian side’s missed chances as Seleznyov took advantage of a bad touch by David Lopez, and unleashed a powerful shot on goal which narrowly missed.
Despite heading into half time all square, the hosts burst out into the second half with the same desire that they finished the first with, this time as Seleznyov broke through the Napoli defence to get onto the end of a chipped pass, cutting the ball over to Luchkevych, who perhaps took too much time on the ball as he was forced into rushing his shot wide of the post.
Play looked to settle down as time wore on, and Napoli started to enjoy a large spell of possession in the opposing half, however an inability to finish chances soon came back to punish Rafa Benitez’s men as Dnipro hit the visitors on the break and finally found the goal they had been searching for.
Konoplyanka beat Maggio on the flank and sent the ball in to Seleznyov, which the striker was able to calmly loop over Andujar and ultimately spell out defeat for the Italians.
Napoli desperately searched for a way back in the remaining minutes and constantly forced their way into the box. Higuain once again came agonisingly close of a goal as his scuffed shot was cleared of the line by defender Douglas, and further attempts from Napoli were pinged out of the box.
The entire Napoli team pushed forward and refused to give up however Dnipro continued to resist and almost scored another counter-attack style goal as they hit the bar.
A tricky final few minutes was not enough to stop the hosts from reaching their first ever European final, and the Ukrainians will now face Sevilla, who beat Fiorentina 5-0 on aggregate, in the Final in Warsaw.
