AC Milan vs. Napoli: Final score 0-4, Italy is on notice

Napoli went to the San Siro and made it feel like home, silencing the rossoneri faithful and humbling AC Milan to the tune of a 4-0 thrashing. Lorenzo Insigne was a tiny god of wrath that was unleashed on Milan, turning in an easy man of the match performance with two goals, an assist, and his non-stop terrorizing of Milan's defense.

The funny thing is that Napoli didn't start off particularly hot in the match. Milan's numbers in midfield gave the partenopei some issues in the opening minutes, but Insigne didn't care and made things happen anyways. On Napoli's first clean break between Milan's lines, Insigne carried the ball down the left and started working his way towards the box, and Gonzalo Higuain started cutting towards him like he was looking for a through ball. That sucked Milan's entire defense over to that side, leaving acres of space for Allan to run through -- and Insigne put the perfect pass in front of his run, leaving Allan needing just a touch to steady the ball and fire past Diego Lopez to put Napoli ahead.

The rest of the first half was a bit of a vague disappointment, though. Napoli struggled to break Milan down, and even though they dominated on the ball, it felt like it wasn't quite enough yet to guarantee a win. Napoli fans are all too familiar with that feeling, and too often it's ended with heartache.

Thanks to a monstrous second half, that's not what happened on Sunday.

In the second half, Lorenzo Insigne took over. Already Napoli's standout performer from the first half, he decided he was tired of this "only winning by one goal" nonsense, scoring with an absolutely wonderful finish of a Higuain cross in the 48th minute, and dropping jaws with this free kick in the 67th. Milan finished the scoring on themselves with a hilarious own goal late in the match, which I'm sure we can find a way to attribute to Insigne despite him having been subbed off a few minutes earlier, because he's just that good.

Screw the haters.

This absolute humbling of a Milan side that's actually been pretty good this season despite their record is a major announcement from Napoli to the rest of Serie A that their early-season struggles are done and that they're here to fight. The Lazio win was great, but the reaction was "yeah, but can they do it again?" Then Napoli did it again against Juventus, and the reaction was "yeah, but Juventus suck this season." Now, there's just one "yeah, but" to be had: yeah, but Napoli have figured it out and are going to kick all your asses.

Note: Thanks for putting up with me not being around yesterday because I was too sick to function, and massive thanks to Kevin McCauley for lending a hand.