La Liga Winners and Losers: Atletico Madrid Blow Away Real, Blow Open Title Race
Gameweek 22 in Spain's top flight had plenty of incidents, goals and memorable matches, none more so than the explosive Madrid derby, as two of the top three met at the Vicente Calderon.
We've rounded up the entire weekend's action, analysed who the big winners and the losers were (yes, outside of the basic three points taken in each game!) and brought them to you right here.
We feature not only those big sides at the top, but every grouping of sides throughout La Liga and let you know exactly what the latest bunch of games means for everyone involved.
Winners: Atletico Madrid, Simeone, Griezmann, Tiago, Siqueira...
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We cannot start anywhere else but with Atletico Madrid, who were nothing short of terrific in their 4-0 destruction of rivals Real Madrid in the derby.
From their off-the-ball pressing to their fast transition play, shifting players onto the front foot and overwhelming the Real defence, Atleti were nonstop and unstoppable in moving from defence to attack.
The goals had quality about the buildup, came from all over the pitch and were more than merited at every stage of the game. A magnificent game plan from manager Diego Simeone was perfectly executed by his players—and not just by the stars.
Left-back Guilherme Siqueira was in top form, Tiago ran the game from midfield, and the front two continued to work perfectly together—deserved and total domination.
Losers: Real Madrid, Ancelotti, Ronaldo, Bale, Kroos, Casillas...
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On the flip side, Real Madrid's 4-0 destruction was an utter capitulation.
When Atleti started faster, worked harder and created the better chances, even before the first goal, there was no movement to bed in, to make the team more compact, to become harder to beat. Real were sloppy in possession, offered little threat or movement in attack and simply succumbed far too easily against opposition who were more prepared to fight and work for the right to play good football.
Manager Carlo Ancelotti wasn't able to change things despite early subs, while the stars of the team—captain Iker Casillas, world's best Cristiano Ronaldo, midfield general Toni Kroos and Co.—were at best anonymous and at worst actively committing mistakes to help out Atletico.
None of the front three, comprising of Ronaldo, Karim Benzema and Gareth Bale, plus subs Jese and Javier Hernandez, managed a single shot on target between them.
Winners: Barcelona's Front 3, Again
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After the Madrid derby furore, Barcelona knew they had an opportunity to close the gap at the top of the table to a single point on Sunday—and they made sure they made no mistakes with a 5-2 win away to Athletic Bilbao.
Once more, it was the awesome attack of Neymar, Luis Suarez and Lionel Messi who did the most damage, scoring one apiece. Messi, in particular, was a thorn for Athletic to deal with, creating and running the entire width of the final third.
Barcelona have now won five in a row in La Liga and nine in a row in all competitions.
Losers: Top-4 Hopefuls
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While Valencia beat Espanyol and Villarreal made light work of Granada, the other two Champions League hopeful teams slipped up this weekend.
Malaga's hopes are surely extinguished after a shoddy 4-1 defeat to bottom club Levante, having only rekindled those flames a few days earlier after beating Valencia on Monday night. The gap between Malaga and the top four is now nine points, though, so we can probably exclude them from our top-four thoughts from this point.
Sevilla were the other defeated side, losing 2-1 at Getafe to a late Pedro Leon goal. Getafe have been hovering around the relegation zone most of the season so it's a poor loss for Sevilla, who have now been defeated in three of their last four league games.
Winners: Relegation Merry-Go-Round Just Won't Stop Turning
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Down at the bottom, there seems to be a new trio of teams below the dotted line each week.
Deportivo La Coruna and Getafe were down there earlier this season, but both have found runs of form to escape and now look good for safety. Athletic Bilbao's horrible start to the season had them in the bottom three for an age, but likewise, they look as though they'll have enough to finish 14th or higher.
Cordoba, Granada, Levante, Almeria and now Elche have all taken turns dodging last place or sitting there awhile before bouncing back up. The weekend saw Levante's big win over Malaga move them off of the bottom and out of the drop zone, while Almeria's win over Cordoba meant they leapfrogged their rivals.
Losers: Inconsistencies Preventing Progress
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In our "Storylines to Watch" series before the weekend, we identified Real Sociedad vs. Celta Vigo as a game both would want to use as a chance to put some consistency in place to aid a push up the table, having both gone through bad runs of late.
So, predictably, the game ended as a 1-1 draw.
These midtable clubs are there for a reason: They just cannot find a run of games to consistently pick up points from, managing only to scrabble about for a win every three matches at best or winning a couple, only to disappointingly drop points again afterward.
Monday night's game sees Rayo Vallecano as another team with the chance to kickstart themselves, playing away to new bottom club Elche. If they win, they can move five places up the table...but given the nonstop rollercoaster at the bottom, as detailed on the previous slide, it'll probably be Elche who emerge victorious!
