FIFA president Gianni Infantino became amongst the ones present in Naples as the southern Italian town honoured one of its adopted sons, who led Napoli to their most effective two league titles and the 1989 UEFA Cup and died a 12 months in the past on Thursday.
Fans chanted Maradona's call as a statue, which depicts their idol in full flight atop the wide variety 10, become carried around the pitch.
A tribute from Pele turned into shown at the stadium's massive screens, whilst players got here out for his or her pre-suit heat-as much as the sound of "Life Is Life" with the aid of Opus, the track to which Maradona does keepie-uppies in one of the maximum beloved pieces of pictures of the Argentine in his pomp.
Inspired by the emotional ceremony, Napoli took full benefit of AC Milan crashing to a 3-1 home defeat against Sassuolo to go it alone at the summit with an at times electrifying performance.
"We installed one of our great performances, now the critical aspect is to usually play like that, due to the fact you want to repeat the ones types of displays. The way we played these days changed into ideal," Dries Mertens informed DAZN, after scoring a incredible double.
Wearing shirts bearing Maradona's face, Luciano Spalletti's desk toppers came out like a team possessed and blew Lazio away with three superb first-half dreams.
- Mertens sweeps Lazio apart -
In almost best concord with the event it turned into some other adopted Neapolitan in Mertens who led the price, the Belgian nicknamed 'Ciro' scoring a top notch brace of which Maradona himself could had been proud.
Piotr Zielinski were given the ball rolling in the seventh minute by almost ripping a hole inside the internet with his rocket opener, and just 3 mins later Mertens took the roof off the Stadio Diego Armando Maradona while he ended a splendid move with the aid of dumping Patric on the deck with a feint and slotting home a fab finish.
After Luis Alberto after which Francesco Acerbi went close for Lazio within the space of a minute, Mertens successfully sealed the win with more than an hour to play with some other tremendous intention, clipping a first-time strike that sailed over a despairing Pepe Reina and accelerated his club-record goal tally to 139.
