Atletico Madrid Edge Past Getafe, but Stop-Start Season in Attack Continues

How does one gauge this current incarnation of Atletico Madrid? Last season, it was pretty straightforward. This season, not so much—Diego Simeone's men are a difficult bunch to evaluate.

Several times now, the new-look Spanish champions have looked ready, in an attacking sense, to break out of their trot and into a gallop. And on each occasion, just as they've looked set to hit the accelerator, they've stagnated.

Shifting through the gears is proving difficult.

Back in September, a historic victory over Real Madrid was quickly followed by a loss to Olympiakos, dropped points to Celta Vigo and an underwhelming scrape past lowly Almeria.

Then came an emphatic 4-0 hammering of high-flying Sevilla. Atletico of last season, many thought, were back.

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But then the same thing happened: Atleti didn't maintain the pace, narrowly edging out Juventus in an attritional affair before being blown away by Valencia.

This week has witnessed a continuation of the pattern, with Los Colchoneros looking dynamic in attack when storming past Malmo FF in the Champions League only to follow it up with a scrappy 1-0 win over Getafe on Sunday that bizarrely saw Simeone's men lose a certain degree of control after their opponents went a man down.

Of course, it's possible to argue that Atletico's stop-start season in attack isn't an issue. They are just two points back from Barcelona and Sevilla at the top of La Liga's table, after all.

But mounting a title charge on the sort of display witnessed on Sunday at the Coliseum Alfonso Perez is going to prove extremely difficult. There's just not enough margin for error.

Interestingly, in the lead-up to his club's clash with Getafe, Simeone spoke at length about his team's work in attack, indicating that the manager isn't all that concerned with Atletico's current brand of football.

"The topic of football is very open and we all have the right to our opinion," Simeone said at his pre-match press conference, per Inside Spanish Football. "Whether it's understood is a different question, but everyone has a right to their opinion."

One sensed the Argentine, having built an extremely fine reputation for himself as a tactician, felt the criticism of his side's work in the final third was unwarranted.

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"For me, I don't dislike when a team wins all their games from strategy plays, it's the most useful tool in football," he added, speaking of Atleti's work at set pieces, which although brilliant, has become something they've been forced to rely upon in the current campaign. "We try to use everything, but it's clear that one of the most useful tools that we have always had since I came here are our strategic plays."

He's not wrong: The capital club has scored 11 of its 15 league goals this season from set pieces, with Mario Mandzukic's winner on Sunday being the latest addition to the collection.

Yet, how long can Atletico stay within reach of a table-topping Barcelona and a barnstorming Real Madrid if their attack from one game to the next is as smooth as a drive with a novice in a manual car?

Sunday yielded three points, yes. But in their title-winning campaign last term, Atleti's combined score against Getafe across two meetings was 9-0. Too easily it's forgotten that there was genuine firepower residing in last season's outfit—it wasn't all brave defending and 90-minute exhibitions of physicality.

As extraordinary as they were without the ball, there were still only eight teams in all of Europe in 2013-14 that were more potent in attack than Simeone's cherished group.

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The issue, however, isn't a matter of style. Atletico, as the club's manager admits, are not built to play to sort of football one associates with their glamorous title rivals both across town and in Catalonia.

"The characteristics that the players have makes our style of football more or less direct," Simeone remarked ahead of the clash with Getafe. "In that regard, the team is improving."

But playing without a flowing style doesn't mean you have to be without bunches of goals. Lifting the trophy last season proved just that.

Of course, the problem lies with personnel. If you hadn't already been aware of it, Diego Costa's immediate ascension to the top of the striker pile in the Premier League this season has shown to all exactly what Atletico have lost.

Mandzukic, his replacement, may be a fine forward himself, but there are few No. 9s in world football who are as complete as the man currently blazing a path around England.

Hence, Simeone has been left with an outfit that, at this stage, is limited offensively, with his most natural scorers—Mandzukic, Antoine Griezmann and Alessio Cerci—all still finding their feet in the Spanish capital after summer moves.

The result has been a stop-start season in attack, cutting Atletico's margins considerably finer as the club looks to once more achieve the seemingly impossible.

For the sake of its title bid, the trend needs to change.