The Senegal international featured for the Parthenopeans while the Super Eagles defender was a second-half substitute at San Paolo
Kalidou Koulibaly was in action as Napoli secured a 2-1 comeback victory over William Troost-Ekong’s Udinese in Sunday’s Serie A game.
Senegal international Koulibaly was handed his 20th league start and helped the Parthenopeans to extend their unbeaten run to five games at San Paolo.
The 29-year-old was part of a four-man defence along with Elseid Hysaj, Konstantinos Manolas and Mario Rui and gave a good account of himself in the encounter.
Gennaro Gattuso’s men last tasted defeat against Atalanta on July 2, winning against AS Roma and Genoa before playing out draws with AC Milan and Bologna.
The game started with a high tempo with both sides aiming to open the scoring and the Parthenopeans enjoyed more possessions of the ball in the opening 10 minutes.
The White and Blacks were, however, first to find the back of the net when Rodrigo De Paul beat goalkeeper David Ospina with a fine strike in the 22nd minute.
The Parthenopeans almost responded immediately when Fabian struck a long-range shot in the 24th minute that forced a save from goalkeeper Juan Musso.
The moment came for Gattuso’s side when Fabian set up Arkadiusz Milik in the 31st minute of the encounter to level proceedings.
The second half was a bit cagey as both sides wasted a number of opportunities that came their way before Matteo Politano scored the winning goal at the death.
Koulibaly featured for the duration of the game, had a 96% successful pass rate and won one aerial contest to help his side avoid a home defeat.
Nigeria international Troost-Ekong made a cameo appearance in the encounter after he was introduced in the 89th minute.
With the result, Napoli climbed to the Europa League spot with 56 points from 34 games, having won 16 matches, drawn eight and lost 10.
Udinese, meanwhile, are now three places above the relegation zone after gathering 36 points from the same number of games.
Koulibaly will hope to help his side continue in winning ways when they face Parma while Troost-Ekong will look to get more minutes under his belt against Juventus, on July 22 and 23, respectively.
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