For six giddy minutes the Stadio Luigi Ferraris believed. Milutin Osmajic had given Genoa a lead they craved, the crowd had found its voice, and a season teetering on the edge looked briefly like it might turn. Then Como arrived, cold and clinical, and simply took the game apart.

By half-time the visitors led 3-1, by full-time 4-1, and the only lingering question was how emphatically the table would reshape itself. Como sit top of Serie A, unbeaten and purring. Genoa remain 20th, without a point, staring at a hole that grows deeper by the week.

This was not a night of misfortune for the hosts so much as a lesson in the gulf between a side building something and a side searching for anything. Genoa struck first and were beaten four different ways by a team that never once looked hurried.

A lead that flattered

The opening was everything Genoa needed it to be. On 19 minutes Lorenzo Colombo slipped the ball into the path of Osmajic, who steadied himself in the centre of the box and swept a left-footed finish into the bottom-left corner. The Ferraris roared, releasing weeks of accumulated tension in a single surge.

It was, briefly, the picture of a team dragging itself off the floor. The lead gave Genoa shape and belief, and for a few minutes they pressed with the urgency of a side that understood exactly what a first win of the campaign would mean.

But leads are only as good as the response they provoke, and Como's answer was immediate and unnervingly composed. Where Genoa celebrated, the visitors simply reorganised, and the tempo of the evening began to slide out of the hosts' grasp almost as soon as they had seized it.

Como's ruthless spell

The equaliser landed on 25 minutes and set the tone for everything that followed. Álex Valle rolled the ball to Martin Baturina, who took aim from outside the box and curled a right-footed strike into the bottom-right corner, a finish of real quality that Genoa had no answer for.

Five minutes later the game turned decisively. Assane Diao cut inside from the right and drilled a left-footed shot into the centre of the goal, and Como led for the first time. The visitors were now moving with the confidence of a side that had sensed weakness and meant to punish it fully.

The third, on 40 minutes, was the pick of them. Yan Couto's delivery found Nico Paz in the centre of the box, and the finish flew off his right foot into the top-right corner, unstoppable and cruel. Three goals in fifteen first-half minutes had flipped a Genoa lead into a rout, and the half-time whistle came as mercy.

No way back

The second half offered Genoa no route to redemption, only the slow confirmation of what the first had already decided. Como managed the game with the ease of a team who knew the contest was over, content to let the hosts tire themselves against a settled defensive block.

The fourth arrived on 78 minutes and carried a signature of pure menace. Moise Kean broke at pace on the counter, fed Diao inside, and the forward finished coolly with his right foot into the bottom-left corner for his second of the night. A fast break, a clinical end, and the scoreline stretched to a punishing 4-1.

For Diao it was a night to remember, a brace announcing his intent; for Genoa it was another reminder of how far the margins have moved against them. Every Como thrust seemed to find the net, every Genoa effort seemed to find a wall.

The reckoning ahead

The table tells the story without embellishment. Como stand top of Serie A on seven points, unbeaten across their opening three matches, seven goals scored and a swagger that this performance only deepened. They look a side capable of holding company at the summit rather than merely visiting it.

Genoa, by contrast, are 20th and pointless, three defeats from three, a solitary goal for and seven conceded. The numbers are unforgiving and the mood at the Ferraris more so, a proud club watching a season slip into crisis before September has properly begun.

What comes next for Genoa is a search for the basics: a clean sheet, a foothold, a first point to arrest the slide. What comes next for Como is the harder, sweeter challenge of proving this start is no accident. On this evidence, the two clubs are travelling in opposite directions at speed.