Scott McTominay, Napoli's Scottish midfielder, enters the 2025-26 off-season having delivered one of the more productive campaigns of his career — ten goals and three assists across 32 Serie A appearances, with an average rating of 7.10 — and now must recalibrate entirely. Massimiliano Allegri has been confirmed as Napoli's new head coach, replacing Antonio Conte, and the appointment reshapes the context around every player at the club, McTominay included.
The significance is structural. Conte built Napoli's midfield around intensity and vertical pressing, and McTominay thrived in that environment, contributing at both ends of the pitch with a frequency that belied his position. Allegri's systems have historically demanded different qualities from central midfielders — more positional discipline, less aggressive pressing, a greater emphasis on managing the ball in transition. Whether McTominay's profile translates cleanly into that framework is the central question of his summer.
His numbers from the season just finished argue for his retention. Ten goals from midfield is a contribution that any Serie A coach would find difficult to discard, and the consistency of his rating across 32 matches suggests he was not a player who flattered in isolated moments. Napoli finished second with 73 points from 37 matches, and McTominay was a material part of that. Allegri will know the data.
The squad around him is already shifting. Eljif Elmas and Juan Jesus have both departed on expired contracts, thinning the depth in central areas and in defence. That attrition, combined with Allegri's need to impose his own identity quickly, means the early weeks of pre-season will carry unusual weight for players whose roles are not yet defined under the new regime.
McTominay is not in that uncertain category by reputation, but no player is automatically guaranteed continuity when a head coach changes. His task now is to demonstrate that his output was a product of his own qualities, not solely of Conte's system — and to do so in front of a manager who has historically been selective about which midfielders he trusts with regular minutes.
Allegri inherits a squad with Champions League ambitions and a fanbase that expects vertical progress. McTominay, with his goal return and his experience of high-pressure environments, is precisely the kind of player a new coach should want to build around. Whether Allegri sees it that way will define the Scot's 2025-26.