Atlético can give Koeman the finishing touch

There are once-in-a-lifetime opportunities and you have to take advantage of them. That is what Atlético de Madrid will try to do this Saturday against Barcelona at the Wanda Metropolitano. The team that Simeone directs is not well, but it faces a giant in low hours and hopes to take a slice by hitting the table in the fight for the high places of the table and, incidentally, sink a rival more direct by title.

More sarcastic than angry even in his last appearance before the media, Ronald Koeman assumes that “a lot of things are leaked” and that this may be his last game in charge of the Barça team if Joan Laporta finds a substitute now that the break for the national team matches. The defeats in the Champions League against Bayern and Benfica, and the two punctures against Granada and Cádiz in the League, have set off all the alarms and have placed the Dutchman practically out. Already sentenced, he faces the duel against Atlético as a true final in the face of the club’s aspirations, but also as a matter of pride to defend his work.

Despite the instability that Barcelona is going through, Koeman’s pupils will land in the mattress fiefdom with the idea of ​​achieving a victory that places them ahead of Atlético and brings them closer to Real Madrid in the table, after both left points for the last day. To do this, Koeman has completed a squad list that includes Jordi Alba, already recovered after his hamstring injury, and homegrown players Demir, Nico, Iñaki Peña and Gavi. Those who will not be will Pedri, due to problems in the quadriceps of his right leg, Ousmane Dembélé, Sergio Agüero and Martin Braithwaite, still with long-term injuries.

The duel against Atlético is one of those marked in red for Barcelona on the calendar. The culé team has not been able to win in the last four matches against Cholo. They fell 2-3 in the 2019 Spanish Super Cup, drew two that same season at the Camp Nou and in the last two visits to Wanda they fell 1-0 and signed the tables without goals.

On this occasion, Koeman’s men face a team with ups and downs. Simeone’s men have been capable of the best and the worst in this course, but last season’s winning inertia is still latent and keeps them in the zone to fight for the title. El Cholo will also be able to count on practically all the heavy artillery that he has except for Matheus Cunha, who goes down due to a left thigh injury, and Geoffrey Kondogbia, who saw the fifth yellow against Alavés and completes a warning cycle.

Reunion night

Simeone will therefore be able to form an eleven full of stars for the enjoyment of a Metropolitan that, for the first time since the pandemic began, will be able to be occupied at 100% of its capacity. In the sessions prior to the crash, Cholo has rehearsed with an eleven in which Joao Félix, Antoine Griezmann and Luis Suárez would form at the attack point, a trident full of quality with which to attack the fragility in defense that Barcelona has shown in the last meetings.

Wanda’s appointment will also be a match with two reunions. Antoine Griezmann, who finally appeared with a good goal on Tuesday at San Siro, and Luis Suárez left through the back door of Barcelona and await these types of matches to claim and show that they still have plenty of football boots to train. part of the culé squad. The Uruguayan arrives at the shock, in addition, after a week in which he has made it clear that he did not like the ways in which they treated him in his farewell. «I do not forget that last year in the preseason they sent me to train separately. I gave myself completely to the club, and that they treated me like that hurt me. Fate will mark who got it right and who didn’t, “said the tip of Salto to warm up the previous match.