Kevin De Bruyne scores twice as Napoli beat Frosinone 3-0 at the Maradona

Napoli had lost two of their previous five league matches going into this one, while Frosinone arrived at the Maradona having won three of their last four. It was the home side who settled the contest, though, with Kevin De Bruyne at the centre of it: the Belgian scored either side of a Noa Lang strike to see Napoli through 3-0 and lift them to eighth.

De Bruyne from the spot, Lang doubles it

De Bruyne opened the scoring from the penalty spot in the 29th minute, and Noa Lang made it 2-0 three minutes later, turning in a chance from open play to leave Frosinone chasing the game well before half-time. The visitors, who arrived on the back of three wins and a draw in their previous four matches, never found a way back into it, and De Bruyne put the result beyond doubt with a second goal deep into stoppage time, finishing from close range after a pass from Giovane in the 94th minute.

Napoli lined up in a 3-4-2-1, with De Bruyne, Noa Lang, Rasmus Højlund and David Neres all involved in a fluid attack all afternoon. Frosinone, who had beaten Como and Venezia in recent weeks and lost only once in their previous five matches, simply could not create enough at the other end to trouble Alex Meret's goal.

The shots-on-target column says it all: eight for Napoli to a single one for Frosinone, even though the visitors were competitive in both possession and passing accuracy for long spells. Amir Rrahmani and Benoît Badiashile were both booked late on, in the 80th and 85th minutes respectively, as Napoli's defenders picked up yellow cards protecting a lead that was never seriously under threat.

Frosinone's run is checked

Frosinone arrived at Naples on 10 points from five matches, having lost only their opening match of the season. That run now has a 3-0 defeat attached to it, and the manner of the loss, outshot 8-1 on target, is the first time this season Frosinone have been that comprehensively outplayed. Napoli, by contrast, had looked short of their early-season level after league defeats at home to Como and away at Inter, and this was the kind of result they needed.

The win takes Napoli to 10 points from six games, 8th in Serie A, level on points with Frosinone, who are 9th on goal difference, and three points behind Cagliari in 4th, the last of Italy's four Champions League places this season. Frosinone stay inside the top half, with their early-season surge checked for the first time by a side that outclassed them for long periods.

De Bruyne's second act

De Bruyne arrived at Napoli as a free agent in June 2025, after a decade at Manchester City that brought six Premier League titles and a Champions League. City did not offer him a new deal, and several clubs circled before he picked Naples, in part to reunite with Romelu Lukaku. Born in June 1991, he turned 35 four months before this match, and a two-goal afternoon against Frosinone was exactly the kind of performance Napoli signed him for: the vision to win and convert a penalty, and the legs to still be finishing chances in the 94th minute of a game he had mostly controlled from midfield.

What's next

Napoli will look to build on this result and close the gap to the Champions League places, while Frosinone's task is to show this was a one-off against a side playing at its best rather than the start of a slide back down the table.