Failure to Build on Real Madrid Drubbing Costs Atletico in Celta Vigo Defeat

Atletico Madrid suffered a damaging loss to Celta Vigo in La Liga on Sunday, succumbing 2-0 to the home side in a disappointing performance at the Estadio Municipal de Balaidos. 

A controversial goal gave the hosts the lead early in the second half, as the referee missed a clear handball by Celta midfielder Augusto Fernandez. The resulting play saw Nolito win a penalty from a challenge by Atletico's Mario Suarez. The forward duly dispatched the spot-kick that followed.

Atletico's night then went from bad to worse. Fabian Orellana finished off an impressive passing sequence from Celta Vigo with a superb strike after being played in by Michael Krohn-Dehli in the 71st minute. The Chilean's goal effectively ended the contest. 

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Though they obtained their lead contentiously, Eduardo Berizzo's men deserved the three points after comprehensively outplaying the defending Spanish champions from start to finish. 

Indeed, Atletico manager Diego Simeone will be furious with his team's inability to build on last weekend's 4-0 thrashing of Real Madrid. The loss leaves Atleti seven points off the pace of their league-leading crosstown rivals and six points back of Barcelona—both of whom claimed victories this weekend. 

Despite last weekend's dominant display in the Madrid derby, Simeone was forced into an array of changes on Sunday. Star midfielder Koke missed out through injury, and both Arda Turan and Raul Garcia were suspended after picking up their fifth yellow cards of the season against Real. 

As a result, the Atleti boss needed to reshuffle his squad. He paired Mario Mandzukic and Fernando Torres up front, with Antoine Griezmann joining Gabi, Tiago and Saul Niguez in a four-man midfield. 

It was the first time Los Colchoneros' three primary forwards had played in the same XI, but it turned out to be a failed experiment for the visitors. Against a Celta Vigo side that typically enjoys the bulk of possession, the visitors' lack of ball-playing midfielders was exposed, leading to Cani's introduction for Torres immediately after half-time. 

It was a necessary change from Simeone, who had watched Celta Vigo completely dominate his team in the opening half.

Celta Vigo's fluid front three—the impressive Nolito and Orellana on either side of Joaquin Larrivey—consistently gave their guests an array of headaches. The two wide men switched from side to side, drove into the penalty area and placed Atleti's full-backs, Juanfran and Guilherme Siqueira, under siege.  

Berizzo's forwards were aided by the home side's midfield, which consisted of Krohn-Dehli, Fernandez and Nemanja Radoja. Those three dominated possession and barely afforded Atletico a single opportunity to escape their own half in the opening 45 minutes. 

Although the hosts controlled the opening period, Celta went unrewarded going into the break because of a lack of killer instinct. 

Griezmann switched to his more customary position alongside Mandzukic after half-time, and it immediately sharpened Atletico's play. But Nolito's controversial opener in the 59th minute proved to be a blow the visitors couldn't overcome. 

Despite Saul forcing a save from Sergio Alvarez in the seconds following Celta's opening goal, the defending champions went 2-0 down 12 minutes later when Orellana's superb finish beat Miguel Angel Moya and thundered into the bottom left corner from the right side of the box. 

From that point, the closest Atletico came to clawing one back was when Siqueira had a penalty claim denied by the referee in the closing minutes. And it could have been worse for Simeone's men, who were extremely fortunate to escape when Larrivey made a mess of a simple tap-in after fine work from Nolito. 

For Celta Vigo, the result is an enormous boost. After an impressive opening to the season that included a victory over Barcelona at the Camp Nou and a 2-2 draw with Atletico at the Vicente Calderon, the Galicians had endured an awful midseason slump with just one win in 12 league games prior to Sunday. 

But the victory over Atleti—the club's second triumph in three games—has pushed Berizzo's men into the top half of the league table ahead of next weekend's Galician derby against Deportivo La Coruna.  

Celta Vigo		Atletico Madrid
Player	Rating	Player	Rating
Sergio Alvarez	7.6	Miguel Angel Moya	6.2
Sergi Gomez	6.7	Juanfran	7.0
Gustavo Cabral	7.3	Diego Godin	7.2
Andreu Fontas	7.3	Miranda	6.9
Jonny	7.1	Guilherme Siqueira	6.4
Augusto Fernandez	7.5	Saul Niguez	7.8
Nemanja Radoja	7.3	Tiago	6.5
Michael Krohn-Dehli	8.2	Gabi	6.6
Fabian Orellana	8.7	Antoine Griezmann	6.3
Joaquin Larrivey	6.6	Fernando Torres	6.2
Nolito	9.2	Mario Mandzukic	6.8
Pablo Hernandez (sub 76')	6.0	Mario Suarez (sub 34')	6.6
Alex Lopez (sub 90')	6.1	Cani (sub 46')	6.1
Santi Mina (sub 90')	6.0	Raul Jimenez (sub 73')	6.0

Yet while Celta Vigo celebrate one of their finest performances of the season, Atletico will rue their failure to capitalise on last weekend's mauling of Real Madrid. 

The defending champions' title bid now hangs by a thread.