Atlético Madrid delivers a huge failure and goes down with relegation


Sunday, May 14, 2023 at 6:11 PM• Jonathan van Haaster • Last update: 18:14

Atlético Madrid has been blaming itself on Sunday afternoon. Trainer Diego Simeone saw his team fall 1-0 at last week Elche, which was officially relegated after a hopeless season last week. The home team nevertheless took the lead just before half-time, because goalkeeper Ivo Grbic completely missed a long throw-in. Atlético definitively relinquishes second place in LaLiga to fellow townsman Real Madrid, which also played poorly on Saturday, but won 1-0 against Getafe.

At Elche, former Ajax player Lisandro Magallán had to make do with a place on the bench. The Argentinian saw compatriot Lucas Boyé form the vanguard, together with Randy Nteka. On the side of Atlético, Memphis Depay was still missing due to an injury. He is in the infirmary together with Stefan Savic, Marcos Llorente, Reinildo Mandava and Jan Oblak. Álvaro Morata was at the forefront together with Antoine Griezmann, while Thomas Lemar, Koke and Rodrigo De Paul formed the midfield. Atlético ‘just’ started with five defenders, despite the fact that Elche only won three times before Sunday afternoon.

Atlético started the game well and soon had a great chance through Morata, who saw his header parried by Elche goalkeeper Edgar Badia. Atlético had the next good opportunity after more than fifteen minutes of play. However, a good cross from the right was barely too sharp for no less than three Madrilenians. Morata seemed to have enough at the far post with a sliding to work the ball in, but he simply remained standing. Elche showed itself more and more as the first half progressed and got shooting opportunities through Randy Nteka and Boyé. They saw their attempts turned around and passed over respectively. Five minutes before the break it was still a hit for the relegated. Grbic completely missed a long throw-in and unintentionally brought the ball to Fidel, who simply tapped in: 1-0.

Griezmann did not play the best game, but showed his class after an hour with a wonderful through ball on Yannick Carrasco. The Belgian seemed to be able to play Badia easily, but did not take the ball well: chance lost. Griezmann distinguished himself again moments later with a through ball, this time on Morata. However, the Spaniard encountered star Badia. Immediately afterwards, crowd favorite Pere Milla headed just wide after a sharp counter. Not Atlético, but Elche was the team that came closest to the second goal of the game in the final phase. Boyé in particular had a huge opportunity from a counter, but his bet went just wide. It turned out not to be an expensive miss, because Elche held on despite a good header for Morata.

No. Team m W G v +/- Pnt
1 Barcelona 33 26 4 3 49 82
2 RealMadrid 34 22 5 7 38 71
3 Atletico Madrid 34 21 6 7 33 69
4 real society 34 18 8 8 14 62
5 Villarreal 34 17 6 11 17 57
6 RealBetis 33 15 7 11 3 52
7 Girona 34 13 9 12 6 48
8 Athletic Club 34 13 8 13 6 47
9 Osasuna 34 13 8 13 -4 47
10 Rayo Vallecano 33 12 10 11 -2 46
11 Seville 33 12 8 13 -8 44
12 Real Majorca 34 12 8 14 -4 44
13 Celta de Vigo 34 10 9 15 -9 39
14 valencia 34 10 7 17 -3 37
15 Almeria 34 10 6 18 -18 36
16 Cadiz 34 8 11 15 -24 35
17 Real Valladolid 33 10 5 18 -27 35
18 Getafe 34 8 10 16 -13 34
19 Espanyol 33 7 10 16 -16 31
20 Elche 34 4 7 23 -38 19