Unexpected Winners: S.S.C. Napoli 1987 Serie A

For many years, the divide in beliefs in Italy has translated into results on the football pitch. North Italy has always been viewed as the industrial centre of the country with the clubs being run in the same efficient manner as some of Italy's biggest companies (Pirelli etc). Southern Italy meanwhile, is more about family, food and passion so the clubs are much more unpredictable and this has created some animosity between them.

This is best demonstrated by the dominance of the northern clubs. In fact, the clubs in the cities of Milan and Turin have combined for a total of 80 Scudetto titles. The two clubs from Rome have only combined for five titles and Fiorentina have another two but they are both technically central Italy.

The first club from Southern Italy to really break the Northern dominance was Napoli in 1987. The Naples based side had perennially missed out on the title but their fortunes would begin to change in 1984 when Gli Azzurri signed a certain Diego Maradona. The Argentine legend had joined Barcelona in 1982 for a world record fee of £5 million but his time at the Nou Camp was fraught with problems. A mixture of injuries and illness meant Maradona spent most of his first season on the side line and his fate was sealed for the Catalan club when he was involved in a mass brawl during the 1984 Copa del Rey final.

Just two months later he had joined Napoli for another world record fee of £6.9 million which ironically was money the club didn't have. Despite that, Maradona was welcomed by 75,000 fans who were convinced that their saviour had arrived. They weren't that far wrong and the Gli Azzurri would finish 3rd in 1986.

The Argentine would return triumphant after the summer as well, having become a national hero by lifting the World Cup in Mexico albeit via his iconic 'hand of god'. With a red hot Diego Maradona, the breakthrough of Ciro Ferrara and the key additions of Andrea Carnevale and Fernando De Napoli, the Naples based club were primed for a run at the title.

Napoli would only lose three games out of 30 that season, partly in thanks to the goalkeeping of Claudio Garella, and with only two points available for a win, the club would clinch the title by three points. It was the first Scudetto for the Gli Azzurri and it sparked wild celebrations in Naples with fans partying for an entire week and holding mock funerals for Juventus and AC Milan.

To top it all off, Napoli would win another title three years later in 1990 once again inspired by the genius of Maradona. However, a combination of the Argentine's drug use and his links with the mafia would eventually spoil his time at the club. He served a 15 month ban for failing a drugs test and would leave under a cloud in 1992.

However, Napoli have failed to win a single Scudetto since 1990 and had to be reformed after they went bankrupt in 2004. The club has worked its way up from the Serie C since then and the last few seasons have got closer to a third title. So far this year the club sits atop the Serie A and could finally end their long drought.