Calcio culture is not a new phenomenon unless you’re an Italian football virgin. If Atalanta-Napoli was the first Serie A match you’d ever watched, you’d be hooked for life, spending hours scraping the web for your next fix.

But being there at the Gewiss Stadium was a blessed experience indeed, especially in a town like Bergamo, a utopia of never-ending church bells and lush scenery, topped only by the electric atmosphere of a Mateo Retegui fizzer to give Atalanta a deserved lead.

From there, the goals were dispersed evenly throughout, as if scripted by the calcio gods roughly every 15 minutes (16, 27, 40, 55, 78) and by five different scorers.

Even if the weight of every subsequent goal was as significant as the previous, the fan reactions made the occasion a spectacle, an energy unmatched by any other Serie A game I’d attended this season. And I was at the Derby della Madonnina.

Matteo Politano brought delirium to the away end. Sardines fit into cans the way Neapolitans assembled themselves into the Settore Ospiti – thousands of loyal servants who spent hard-earned Euros to bolster their side’s confidence at the Gewiss, the centrepiece of Bergamo’s Città Bassa.

“But Napoli are top of the table, as if they need confidence,” I hear the naysayers cry. Yes and no: Of their three losses this season, two came at home and just one (a 3-0 loss in Verona) on the road. Still, Antonio Conte’s worst loss at the Stadio Diego Maradona was against Gian Piero Gasperini’s merry band, dispatched 3-0 again.

Defeat like that can only brew in a player’s mind, and it transferred over to the fans, palpable pre-match for those who saw this as a six-pointer.

Yet, in Bergamo – the small city that rules Europe – Conte’s men recycled their November embarrassment into something more sustainable, fortifying their credentials for a fourth Scudetto and gifting the travelling Partenopei contingent something special.

And it felt special to be there, sandwiched between the away fans and some of Atalanta’s finest. Emotions ran high as the two Tifoserie (sets of fans) traded blows. But as Politano, Giovanni Di Lorenzo, and Frank Zambo Anguissa alluded to in the previous weeks, little Daniele is pulling a string or two from the heavens.

I’ll ask again. Kvara-WHO?

This is by no means a dig at Khvicha Kvaratskhelia’s spell at Napoli – a former MVP and Scudetto winner – but more a nudge to how Conte and his men are still playing at such a high level despite the Georgian’s departure for PSG.

Critics would have claimed that Kvara’s sale put Napoli in crisis had they lost. But Scott McTominay made the Azzurri tifoseria forget all about the transfer dramas of the previous week by reversing the 1-0 deficit.

The Bergamaschi often rely on Ademola Lookman, and he didn’t disappoint. Fifty-one shades of blue and black dominated the venue – yes, Atalanta fans are brilliant – but sometimes the tiny slither of away support emerges the happier (just ask Stephen Faughnan).

If only there was a publication that explained how to get to Serie A and Serie B games.

The McTominay goal to give Napoli the lead was the spark, Lukaku’s header incendiary. This was a five-goal epic that belongs in Destination Calcio’s Classic Calcio series.

Watch the Atalanta-Napoli Serie A Highlights