Good Job, But For The Love Of God… Score!

By: Al | March 8th, 2009

This right here, friends, is the man of the hour, the holiest of the pretty blonde strikers, Diego Forlán.

All I have to say is: ho-ho-ho-holy crap. That was easily one of the best Atletico performances that I’ve seen all year, even if some of our players had an off day, out of ALL days. We did the unthinkable and we actually scared Real Madrid into thinking that they would lose. We outplayed them, we hit that crossbar a few times, and we overall gave them a “bailada” to remember. 1-1 is an unfortunate scoreline but I’ll take it.

Is it too early to say that we’ve found our true form? I still think it is, but from what I’ve seen from this team I’m just anxious to see more. This, my friends, is the closest we’ve gotten to matching last season’s Atlético squad. The best teams are the ones that are a pleasure to watch, and yesterday’s Atlético squad was the best team on the pitch.

REAL MADRID 1 – ATLETICO 1

Real Madrid wasn’t having a bad day, in fact they were playing their same usual match. If Raul was a bit quicker and Robben was a bit less selfish with the ball, they could have scored two goals in the first 15 minutes. Madrid unleashed shots from everywhere, and it was hard to remain calm knowing that they were capable of scoring at any moment. It was scary.

Atletico responded to Madrid’s attacks with something better: flair. They began playing Madrid’s game and pushing that ball up. Maxi’s flick to Aguero in the first half was absolute genius, and unfortunately Aguero couldn’t position his shot and shot the ball AT Casillas for one of his best chances in the game. Missed chance, but at least we broke through the Madrid defense.

Another quick one-two was what got us our goal: It was two against one and Forlan shot the ball past Casillas. The sound of merengue silence is the sweetest sound. 0-1 and we thought we were superheros. However, to know Real Madrid you must know that they’re pretty good at comebacks. Not the time to get excited quite yet.

Real’s goal was unfortunate, but everyone saw it coming. A nice pass from Higuain to Huntelaar (a Dutchie was bound to score) was clearly offside, but he slotted the ball in anyway. As Real were starting to continue their good momentum, Atlético got their “why the hell didn’t that go in?” moment right after when Forlan smashed the ball to the goalpost and it ricocheted in front of Maxi who was too slow to touch it and just tap it in into a Casillas-less part of the goal. What an amazing display of resilience from Forlan, but damn you Maxi.

The reason the match ended 1-1 was obvious: there were too many missed chances for us in the match. Just watch the highlights video and feel the anguish for yourselves. The only thing that brought us back in this match was our “unable to score” syndrome where even our most skilled players (Aguero, Maxi, Sinama) f*cked up, er, slipped and were too nervous to position a decent shot. I absolutely hate the saying “the match should have been [insert score line]“, but what the hell… the match should have been 5-1 to Atlético. Seriously. I can’t stay mad at Kun Aguero because he’s Kun Aguero, but a player of his quality shouldn’t miss so many one-on-ones. Definitely not his day, however, Forlan was the better striker again and not only scored but also worked hard to get some solid assists.

More Forlán for y’all.

Yes, we deserved to win but didn’t. But why am I so happy with the team?

First of all, I’m happy that Real’s chase to the Liga title was slowed down and now they’re 6 points behind. Holding back Real = happiness in the Atlético camp. We were also the first non-Barcelona team to hold Ramos’ Real Madrid squad.

Most importantly, I’m excited for the long-run effect of these matches. What does playing two great matches against the top teams in Spain mean for our team? It means that we’re capable of giving any team a good match. We are no slouches. I wouldn’t doubt that Atlético can beat Villarreal next weekend. Hell, this squad can defeat our other direct rivals later in the season (Valencia, Depor) if we keep at it. We have more home matches than away matches, and if we can beat all the “little” teams and defeat Villarreal and Valencia at least once, that’s it: fourth place is ours. Or maybe third place, if Sevilla manages a 10 points worth slippage.

A team this talented shouldn’t be losing at home to the likes of Bilbao and Valladolid. What our club is known best for is underperforming, and strings of disappointing results are known as the “Atlético routine” in Spain. Atlético shot themselves in the foot already and should be much higher up the table, but the team keeps on playing matches this well, then we’ll be saying hello to the Champions League again. That means I can still buy a cool Atlético Champions League jacket on their official store. Once I stop being broke that is.

I’ll keep on being excited for the future, but the focus now is on Porto this Wednesday. Porto is a fantastic team and it’ll be difficult to say the least. I’m officially afraid of Lisandro Lopez.

Aupa!