What’s wrong with Atlético Madrid?

After a summer that saw Atletico Madrid spend €185 on new players, the biggest outlay of any Champions League club, there are high hopes that Diego Simeone now has the tools to be competitive on all fronts this season. .

However, with the season now two and a half months old, Atleti are already 10 points behind the leaders of LaLiga and have lost two of their opening three Champions League games.

After Sunday’s 1-0 defeat against Real Betis, on a Clasico weekend when they knew they would have a chance of keeping pace with at least one of Real Madrid and Barcelona, ​​Atleti have now won just two of eight games in all competitions.

The win was an accidental 1-0 win at Vigo and a home win against newly promoted Leganes. The results weren’t pretty and as troubling as it is for anyone connected with Atleti, the underlying numbers don’t add up to anything better.

The worrying numbers behind the worrying results

Atleti’s start to the season is actually not bad. They won four of their first six games and looked increasingly confident with three wins in a row in mid-September when recent opponents Athletic were beaten in Bilbao and RB Leipzig were finally knocked out in the Champions League, thanks in large part to a classy performance from Antoine Griezmann .

However, their performance levels and results have dropped significantly since then, with worrying aspects to almost all of their eight appearances since the game against Leipzig.

They have kept just one clean sheet since then, with Robin Le Normand failing to feature in central defense in recent weeks, following a nasty head knock in the Madrid derby. While Atleti maintain the best defensive record in LaLiga, conceding seven goals in Champions League games against Benfica and Lille, suggests that a return for Le Normand is not in the near future.

In fact, you can look at almost every part of Atleti’s current team and see the problems. The balance is not right in midfield or attack, with routine structural and personnel changes failing to fix the problem.

In only two of their last eight games have Atleti attempted more than their opponents. Sometimes, the differences are stark. The shot tally was 19-4 in Benfica’s favor as the Portuguese side cruised to a 4-0 win in the Champions League. The score was 16-4 just four days later at Donostia, as Real Sociedad failed to capitalize on their lead with a 1-1 draw.

Meanwhile, Sunday’s match against Real Betis saw the Seville side, missing their two most dangerous attacking players in the absence of Isco and Giovani Lo Celso, mustering 24 attempts on goal to Atleti’s 10.

According to FBref.com, they created more xG than their opponents in just three of their last eight matches, finishing second best in that metric against Rayo Vallecano, Celta Vigo, Real Sociedad and Betis in LaLiga.

Too many changes?

With four big players joining, following the addition of Le Normand, as well as Julian Alvarez, Alexander Sorloth and Conor Gallagher, Atletico Madrid appear to have the squad depth to attack LaLiga and the expanded Champions League.

A busy schedule at the start of the season, especially in Spain with two midweek LaLiga games also crammed into the opening two months of the season, undoubtedly presents a dilemma for the coaches of the continent’s biggest clubs.

It didn’t take long for us to get an idea of ​​how Diego Simeone would approach it. In the 45th minute, Sorloth was unceremoniously withdrawn at halftime on his return to the Estadio de la Ceramica, just moments after heading his debut goal.

Although Simeone explained the change as a tactical adjustment to bring a different type of striker into the game, it largely dictates the direction of the season as the Argentinian clearly wants to keep all his players on their toes and no one feels insecure about his abilities. they. a place in the starting Eleven.

This can certainly be seen as a positive thing. The logic is understandable considering Atletico Madrid’s unrelenting schedule has seen just 15 games in all competitions before the end of October, compared to 13 in the same period last season.

This may be an attempt to change rotation, which to some degree has always been necessary, into something more akin to natural competition, with changes based on individual performances and the different needs of each game.

The result has often left Atleti feeling like a disjointed team without a strong eleven emerging and new players taking longer to adapt than if they had been given more continuity.

Only two outfield players have started more than seven of their 11 league games so far. The changes to the regular formation are as striking as the six different systems already in use according to FBref.

The contrast with table-toppers Hansi Flick’s Barcelona, ​​who face the same number of games, is stark. Although Simeone opts to make changes in almost every game, Flick has quickly adapted his system and has six players who have started at least 10 of the Catalan club’s 11 LaLiga games so far.

This of course raises potential questions about the risk of end-of-season fatigue, but Atleti will find it difficult to play long games with so much to improve on.

Simeone is to blame

As the longest serving coach in Spain’s top flight and someone who completely changed Atletico Madrid’s fortunes as a football club, Diego Simeone is in the rare position of not having to worry about his future, even when results and performance are poor. serious changes for the worse, as has occurred in recent weeks.

While the patience of any club’s top brass and fan base will eventually have its limits, Atletico fans can take solace in knowing that there have been periods like this in the past, especially in the seasons before the club’s final title triumph in 2020/21. .

Behind the closed doors of the dressing room, he may have had harsher words for his players, but at least in public, Simeone is now happy to take responsibility and take the blame for his team’s current struggles.

“It was clear that the start of the game was not good” he said after the defeat to Betis. “The first game came, they scored, they attacked and we couldn’t play the game we wanted. “Obviously the coach’s preparation for the match was not good.”

“The coach has not been able to provide what the players need for this match,” he continued. “We prepared in a certain way but we weren’t able to do it. The coach had the idea, the players represented it, but it was the coach’s fault.”

Atleti are now just nine days away from visiting PSG in the Champions League where, based on current form, they are likely to suffer a third successive defeat in the competition.

The new format, and a few favorable fixtures remaining, means that defeat in the French capital may not have fatal consequences when it comes to Los Rojiblancos’ future in Europe after the league phase, but they are already running out of steam if they want to. to keep the house competing for top spot in LaLiga.

This of course gives rise to a wider debate about what realistic expectations Atletico Madrid should have. With more resources than 17 of the 19 other clubs in LaLiga, it is clear that they must compete at the top of the standings, but that does not mean that finishing behind Barcelona or Real Madrid is automatically considered a failure. .

It is still early days in this marathon 2024/25 campaign, which may not end for Atleti until mid-July given their participation in the FIFA Club World Cup.

Diego Simeone still has plenty of time to find a solution and get this team back in the right direction.

Based on what we have seen over the past month, there is a lot of room for improvement as Atletico Madrid face more obstacles than expected, following their most daring and ambitious summer in years.