Jeroen van PoppelDecember 29, 2020 • Latest update: 18:11

Atlético Madrid is about to bring in Marcos Alonso on a rental basis, it reports The Independent. The news has been verified and confirmed by Marca. The Madrid people rent the thirty-year-old full-back for six months from Chelsea, where he had ended up on the second plan. Atlético Madrid is making that decision in view of the mega suspension of Kieran Trippier, who has to miss twelve games for breaking the betting rules.

Already in the summer transfer period, Alonso was explicitly linked to a departure from Chelsea. At that time, Atlético Madrid was also mentioned as a possible new destination, but a transition did not happen then. Alonso even started Chelsea’s first three league games in the starting line-up, but serious mistakes in the game against West Bromwich Albion cost the Spaniard dear. Chelsea were 3-0 down at half time, when Alonso was replaced by furious manager Frank Lampard. Since then, the left back has not played a minute.

Chelsea made a further 23 million euros to Fiorentina in the summer of 2016 for the services of Alonso. The fullback and left midfielder started strongly on his adventure at Stamford Bridge: in his first three seasons, Alonso was the regular base player. From last year onwards, he ended up on the bench more and more and this season he has only three appearances. In total, Alonso is on 152 official matches for Chelsea, scoring 22 times and giving 17 assists.

Alonso can be seen as an asset to the breadth of Atlético’s selection. Due to the long absence of Trippier los Colchoneros sparsely occupied on both back positions. Diego Simeone will probably choose Sime Vrsaljko as a direct replacement for right back Trippier. Renan Lodi is Atlético’s regular left back, but Simeone had little choice behind that. Manu Sánchez can also play as a fullback, but only played one official game this season.