McTominay drags Napoli through Bodø scare

Napoli got the result they needed, but not the quiet evening a coach under pressure might have ordered. Scott McTominay scored his first two goals of the season in a 4-3 win over Bodø/Glimt, a match that kept bending away from control and then, just enough for Napoli, back toward it.

The useful fact for Napoli is the one that survives the noise: they won. The more revealing one is that they still needed nearly every good thing McTominay gave them to do it.

Matteo Politano put Napoli ahead in the first minute, which should have been the start of a settled night. Instead it became the first false promise. Jens Petter Hauge levelled for Bodø/Glimt, and the pattern was set: every time Napoli seemed ready to establish authority, the Norwegian side pulled them back into a contest of nerve.

McTominay restored the lead before the break. Andreas Helmersen equalised again. On a night when Napoli needed one player to make the game simpler than it felt, McTominay did precisely that. His second goal arrived on 71 minutes, and when Odin Bjørtuft turned into his own net late on, Napoli finally had the margin they had spent the evening failing to build for themselves.

Even then, Bodø/Glimt found an injury-time goal through Sondre Brunstad Fet, a final reminder that Napoli’s grip never looked especially comfortable.

That matters because the scoreline and the pressure around Allegri point in different directions at once. A win can steady a table and soften a conversation. It does not erase the fact that Napoli conceded three times and never truly shut the game down. In Europe, that habit has a way of returning at the worst moment.

Still, this was McTominay’s night, and not only because of the finishing. According to the Guardian’s report, he had also hit a post, and the broader significance sits in where he has come from. He had missed a month of the season after undergoing a surgical procedure in early September to treat an irregular heartbeat. For a midfielder returning from that, two goals in a Champions League tie are not a romantic detail; they are competitive substance. Napoli needed thrust, repeat running, and somebody willing to keep arriving in the right place after the game had already become messy. He supplied all three.

There is also something fitting about McTominay doing it in this kind of match rather than a polished one. Napoli were not carried by a grand system or by an evening of total command. They were carried by interventions: Politano striking early, McTominay twice repairing the damage, and an own goal finally creating room to breathe. Sometimes that is what pressure football looks like. Not elegance. Just enough correct decisions, made before the next mistake arrives.

For Allegri, the relief is real because the alternative would have been ugly. For Napoli, the warning remains attached to the same result. Bodø/Glimt were beatable, and dangerous enough to show where the evening could have broken.

McTominay made sure it did not.