Atlético Madrid fell at the doors of a fourth Champions League final, losing the second leg of their UEFA Champions League semi-final 1-0 in London and 2-1 on aggregate.
Bukayo Saka turned in from close range on the stroke of half time after Jan Oblak had saved brilliantly from a Leandro Trossard shot which proved to be the key moment in this tie.
It wasn’t meant to be for Diego Simeone’s men, who lacked the punch that we’ve seen help them dismantle quality sides many times this season.
He’ll have to implant the appropriate motivation into his players to finish off the last four games of the LALIGA season with some sort of pride.
For now, here are Into the Calderón’s key takeaways from this painful night at the Emirates Stadium.
El Cholo is not El Mago
So much has been said of Atlético’s strength in depth over the last two years, with the amount of money spent on transfers frequently quoted as a metric to measure success against.
While it’s true that the squad at Simeone’s disposal is (on paper, transfer value, etc) the best it has been since he arrived 15 calendar years ago, the pedigree of the players who were required to complete the second-half turnaround weren’t quite up to the standard of a European semi-final, perhaps.
Atleti can look at this Arsenal side and relate: they are England’s nearly men. However, they have consolidated themselves as being of the quality to win, despite their repeated and hilarious ability to throw every attempt away.
The minimal contents of their trophy cabinet doesn’t change the fact that their players are really good, including those coming off the bench to see the match out. When it came to injecting the final impulse of energy that the last 30 minutes of a Champions League semi-final needs, the likes of Álex Baena and Thiago Almada, in theory of the level necessary, just don’t have the same pedigree as the two Martins on Mikel Arteta’s bench.
Ødergaard and Zubimendi helped the little old Arsenal lady finally cross the road after, in reality, being fortunate to do so over the course of the two legs.
Atleti weren’t bad, Simeone didn’t make mistakes and we could talk about the bad luck/injustice until the cows come home. But quite often Diego himself says that matches are in the hands of God. And this time God, whoever and wherever they may be, didn’t allow Atleti to win. They seem to have done that a lot over the years.
We made it to May
Five consecutive trophyless seasons have now passed since Atleti won LALIGA during the pandemic season of 2020-21.
After two of those, as the squad accumulated some questionable names, my expectations reduced and I did not ask for trophies anymore. Instead, I wished to be still within a shot of winning something by the time May came around.
Nothing is worse than being out of every competition and your league position unthreatened with April’s (or worse, March’s) page in the calendar still on show.
Last year was tough — out of everything by April 2 with a cruel run of fixtures our demise. This year, when it became apparent that we were to play Real Madrid, Barcelona, Barcelona, Sevilla, Barcelona and the Copa del Rey final in consecutive matches, I feared the worst.
The funny (infuriating) thing about the way the Spanish cup final is scheduled is that you can win it and still have nothing left to play for in May. Atleti did not win it.
The only fruit bore worth eating from that run was a Champions League semi-final whose second leg was the other side of April. So it’s an improvement: we had something to play for in May.
However, the demands of March and April stack all the physical odds against you when that thing to play for pits you up against an Arsenal side more rigid than a Mormon’s moral compass.
Coming into the most important continental match Atleti have had in a decade, they were unable to count on the full fitness of a game winner in Julián Alvarez, or a man who can change the complexion of a game in Alexander Sørloth. Instead, the Colchoneros were reliant on a 34- and imminently-departing 35-year-old who weren’t meant to even be playing much this year.
Arsenal will claim similar physical ailments from a taxing campaign in a high-quality domestic sphere which hampered their preparations. But Simeone will speak of having to do it in all three competitions against Barcelona and Real Madrid, placing Atleti’s struggles in its own unique tier.
I’m not sure what I’d prefer: undergo an arduous monumental physical effort to win three competitions as the underdog giving huge merit to any one of them? Or be domestically unchallenged, giving you the energy of a 6-year-old boy on summer break every time you play in the Champions League?
I guess if I preferred the latter, I’d be a Bayern Munich or PSG fan.
There’s no Champions League in America
There used to be. That was until 2023 when CONCACAF changed their continental competition to be called “The Champions Cup,” which doesn’t have the same feel to it, does it?
Anyway, Antoine Griezmann will arrive stateside as one of the best players to hail from European lands, certainly of the 2010/20s era, and yet he has never won LALIGA, and now we can officially say the same about the Champions League.
What a shame. Not just for Antoine, but for a whole crop of players who have come so close and would easily occupy spots in the “Best XI to never have won the Champions League.”
Koke and Jan Oblak have most probably just seen their last chance to win la orejona go by, and I wouldn’t be surprised if they follow Griezmann over the Atlantic this summer or next.
While all three played in that final of 2016, they’ve never had a season where, in the two main cup competitions, they have progressed further than Real Madrid and Barcelona. Yes, the Copa del Rey was a failure (not just this year but all the other years a team other than the big two won it).
Not winning the Champions League when taking into account the other three semifinalists would be harshly classed in the same category, but it’s an opportunity missed that could take a while to come back around. And you just know the next time it does, Real Madrid will be standing in the way.
Maybe that’s it: Atlético Madrid are only destined to win the Champions League if they beat Real Madrid on the way to doing so.