Napoli strike new stadium deal with city

A week after there was uncertainty over whether or not Napoli could play in the Stadio San Paolo for a crucial match, such concerns have been laid to rest for the time being: the club and the city of Naples have come to an agreement to allow Napoli to use and control the stadium for the next two years.

It's a pricey deal, costing the club upwards of €780,000 per year, with additional per-match fees for advertising and public transport subsidies. While it's going to cost the club a fair amount of money, though, it at least represents a step in the right direction in Napoli's rather contentious relationship with the city council, which is arguably the more important element for these negotiations.

Considering that these negotiations broke down before the Fiorentina match when the council's representatives left a meeting about this contract less than a third of the way through it, actually getting this deal done now without too much more public discontent is a good sign. Now the club and city need to start finally getting over their differences in the stadium renovation issues -- problems which have dragged out for over two years now with no resolution in sight.

We've talked about it at length before -- the San Paolo is in desperate, dire need of renovation and modernization. Napoli are losing tons of money every match day in opportunity costs because of the poor state of the the stadium and it's facilities. Hopefully this deal helps pay the way for getting a renovation deal done, because neither club nor city can afford to wait much longer.