Ancelotti: Napoli Would be 'idiots' not to Make Champions League Knockout Stage

By Max Wise

Carlo Ancelotti is confident of Napoli reaching the knockout stage of the 2018/19 Champions League, and says the Azzurri will ‘really be idiots' if they fail to do so.

Group C is widely open ahead of the fifth round of games on Wednesday with Liverpool sitting on top with six points and followed by Napoli, who also have six points. Paris Saint-German are third with five points while Red Stars Belgrade sit at the bottom with four points.

Napoli host Red Stars Belgrade at the Stadio San Paolo, and a win will put them into the knockout stage provided Liverpool avoid defeat at PSG in the other group game at the Parc des Princes in France.

Any other results will push qualifications down to the last round of games, but Ancelotti believes his team will surely grab one of the tickets.

"We are well placed in what was an almost impossible group, and now we can put the cherry on top," says Ancelotti. "Our objective is to go through, and we either do that now or in our last game. It doesn't change much.”

"It's going to come down to the last game and I will go as far to say that, in the position we are in, if we don't go through, we'd really be idiots."

Red Star Belgrade held Napoli and beat Liverpool 2-0 in Belgrade, and the Italian trainer says the Serbian giants have been underrated by the other teams in the group.

"They may have lost their two away games, but they deserved to beat Liverpool at home," he said. "I expect them to be organised, particularly defensively, and they will try to hit us on the break.

"They've been a bit under-estimated so far."