Atletico Madrid Should Beat Leverkusen as More UEFA Champions League Fun Beckons
If an Atletico Madrid supporter's first thought upon seeing the draw for the Champions League last 16 were to check the Bundesliga table, then they'd have been pleased with what they found.
Bayer Leverkusen are down in eighth place in the German top flight. They’ve lost six times in the league already this season, conceding 21 goals in their 14 games. They aren’t great, but they are in the last 16 of Europe’s premier club competition, so obviously they have their merits.
Coming through a group behind AS Monaco and ahead of Tottenham Hotspur and CSKA Moscow was hardly Europe’s toughest challenge this season, but they managed to do it, and for that they should be respected. However, there is little doubt that they represent one of the kinder draws that Atleti could have hoped for.
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Indeed, they are an opponent that will say a lot more about this Atleti side than others could have done.
One of five teams Diego Simeone’s side could have faced, Leverkusen were one of three who would put the emphasis on the team from the Spanish capital—the others being the Portuguese duo of FC Porto and Benfica.
Most would expect Atleti to come through a tie against any of those three teams, but one of the other two potential opponents—Manchester City and Paris Saint-Germain—would have made for a different story and more of a classic European two-legged affair that would likely have been a nervy one.
Atletico could have played the underdogs in those games, just as they have done to great effect against almost all of the European big boys they’ve faced in the past three seasons bar Real Madrid, who beat them in two finals and at the quarter-final stage in 2015.
If you’re looking for connections between that season and this one, then how about the fact it was Leverkusen’s star striker, Javier Hernandez, who got Real’s winner in that quarter-final. And to reach that stage, Atleti had beaten the German side on penalties in the second round on a night which truly announced the qualities of Jan Oblak.
The Slovenian goalkeeper came on as a substitute for the injured Miguel Angel Moya in the first half and went on to make a crucial save from Hakan Calhanoglu in the shootout. He’s never lost his place in the side since, but the team he’s playing behind these days seems an awful lot different to one he was back-stopping then.
That is why a team like Leverkusen will cause Simeone’s side problems, with the key element being that Atletico have to know that they have the answers to those problems within them. They have to believe that they have the attacking qualities required to flourish.
They are a better side than the one they’ll be facing—and one of the best sides in the Champions League this season, judging by their 100 per cent record after five matches. They were the only team that had such a record until they lost a meaningless final game of the group stage at Bayern Munich.
They’ll return to Germany on February 21 next year for an altogether more important match, and one that will no doubt already be on Simeone’s mind given his Champions League exploits in the past few years and his team's struggles domestically this season.
After two near-misses in three years, this tournament surely haunts the Atletico boss. He’s had some of the greatest nights of his managerial career in it but also surely the two worst.
The psychological barriers that have been placed in his mind after those losses to Real Madrid in 2014 and 2016 might never be overcome, perhaps playing a part in his decision earlier this year to shorten his contract.
It could well be that this is a man and a manager in need of a new environment and a new challenge to feel that fire burning within him again, but this draw gives him a golden chance to reach the last eight of the Champions League for a fourth year in a row, the type of consistency that has always been beyond Atletico before.
He needs to tap into that sense of pride he took, and the good fun he had, in leading his team on a march through Europe, because anything is possible.
Leverkusen are beatable, and Simeone has to be looking at this tie and licking his lips.
There is plenty to get out of the way before it comes around, not least important league fixtures as the challenge to get back into the Champions League next season heats up thanks to their domestic struggles and the efforts of teams around them, but this is truly a match to look forward to.
Leverkusen are just OK.
They were the key beneficiaries of Tottenham’s struggle to adapt to playing their home fixtures at Wembley Stadium, where Kevin Kampl’s goal secured a victory for Roger Schmidt’s side in what was the crucial match of the group in early November.
Leverkusen were unbeaten in that group, drawing four of their six matches and adding a 3-0 win over an already qualified Monaco in their final match to that success against Spurs.
They’ll be organised and difficult to break down, respectful of their opposition and indeed of their own reputation as steady combatants in this competition ever since their shock run to the final in 2002. But they’ll be beatable.
Whomever they were drawn against, it would be a large shock if they were to make it past the second round. That seems to be their limit most seasons unless they’ve dropped out of the Champions League and ended up in the Europa League.
They might not even be there at all next season given their Bundesliga struggles and the rise of teams such as RB Leipzig, Hertha Berlin, Hoffenheim and Eintracht Frankfurt—currently occupying positions second to fifth respectively—in Germany, with some of the older order squeezed down the table.
Atletico might well end their Champions League participation for some time, but they won’t be thinking about that come late February.
This might not be one of the ties that will get Europe’s blood pumping, but when you’ve been a finalist in two of the previous three seasons, you at least deserve more than a little respect.
Atletico—whatever their situation—will get that, but they’ll also offer it to Leverkusen.
Simeone knows just how to get the best out of his players in moments such as these, and although it will be a different tie to the one we could have expected had Atletico been paired with Manchester City or PSG, it is certainly one that Cholo will be confident of winning.
If his team can taste victory, then it’ll be on to the last eight. And you won’t find many teams there who’ll be wanting to play an Atletico side on the march in Europe again.
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