On the eve of the derby, Diego Simeone described this as a special week in Madrid, a “tremendous energy about the city”, and it closed the way he wanted. He had enjoyed the Formula One, he said, and he had enjoyed seeing Shakira in concert, but he enjoyed this even more. At least he did by the time the last of many, many blows on the referee’s whistle brought it to an end, sprinting up the tunnel punching the air. Having been 2-0 up against 10 men through goals from Álex Grimaldo and Jonathan David, seemingly in control, a late header from Antonio Rüdiger awoke old ghosts and brought tension, but they did it.
“A lot has happened in the city but this was the only thing that mattered in his mind and mine,” Atletico keeper Jan Oblak said afterwards. José Mourinho’s first derby back at Real Madrid ended in defeat and recriminations: he turned up in the press conference with a picture of two moments in which he claimed that Lee Kang-in and Cristian Romero should have been sent off and insisted the story was there. And yet there are other questions: over the way Dean Huijsen gave away the penalty and got the red card that tilted the game against them, and how his team played, how little they did.
It is 13 years since these two managers met in this fixture, their last time the night Atlético won the Cup at the Santiago Bernabéu. Then, Mourinho was sent off and didn’t collect his medal from the king. His return has been driven by nostalgia and it was like old times in the press room. At times in the first half it was like old times on the pitch too. And that’s not always good.He and Simeone are “companions of war”, he had said, and so it was.
Twenty minutes passed before the first shot, Aurélien Tchouaméni striking over from 25 yards, and it was not until the 39th minute that there was a shot on target when Atlético’s Jan Oblak pushed Arda Guler’s long-range effort away. Otherwise, there was little football but it had been heating up from the beginning, Guler the first to confront the referee after a foul by Álex Baena. To which he responded by fouling Baena back. From the bench, something was said and Diego Simeone was booked; the scene had been set.
Atlético kept the ball but tended to approach with caution. The roar that greeted a Marc Pubill tackle when Kylian Mbappé briefly broke said something about the fear that it was in transition that Atlético would be caught. The fear and perhaps, in Mourinho’s case, the plan. They waited deep. Atlético probed from wide, almost always the right wing. An advance on that side led to Ibrahima Konaté doubting and Giuliano Simeone flashing wide. At the other end Vinícius Júnior shot over twice before the half’s most significant moment. Which, appropriately, was not about the play.
Jude Bellingham slid in to tackle Romero and the referee showed him a yellow. Bellingham, his teammates and the bench were incensed and the video assistant referee was engaged. The referee Miguel Ángel Ortiz, struggling to control this, went to the screen where he saw Romero’s studs hit Bellingham’s knee. The decision was reversed, the Englishman’s yellow taken away and shown to the Argentinian instead. The hosts still felt it should have been red for Bellingham. When Lee’s studs went in on Federico Valverde’s ankle, Real did too. Confrontations continued, words exchanged, but chances didn’t come. At half-time Atlético’s goalkeeper coach and Real’s assistant were sent off.
The second half began with Koke introduced and Baena forcing a save. It was Atlético’s first shot on target and the start of a different game. Their second soon after gave them the lead and an advantage that was even bigger. A long ball from David Hancko dropped into the run of Simeone and as he dashed into the area Huijsen dragged him down. Ortiz pointed to the spot. He was also called to the screen again – not to overturn the penalty but to change the colour of the card. Huijsen walked, Grimaldo scored and the Metropolitano exploded.
You suspected Mourinho would too. First, he removed Guler and Vinícius to introduce Yan Diomandé and Rüdiger. Vinícius had done little and a readjustment was required but there have been times when decisions like this – the Brazilian’s removal in last year’s clásico was the beginning of the end for Xabi Alonso – have caused splits. It did not improve things either. Instead, Real were oddly passive and Atlético doubled the lead. It came from the right where Lee, outstanding, worked the ball to Simeone. His low cross, bent behind Madrid’s back four, was perfect. Six yards out, David turned it in.
Still Atlético came. Courtois made an extraordinary save from Romero and Konaté cleared off the line from Julián Alvarez. Real could do nothing, seemingly concerned only with limiting the damage. Oblak barely saw them. Real did not touch the ball in his area until they scored. Kylian Mbappé barely touched the ball anywhere. Inside Atlético’s half, a pigeon pecked the grass, uninterrupted.
When Diomandé did at last dash into that space with 15 minutes to go, Oblak saved, the opportunity to make a match of this wasted. Or so it seemed until, from a dead ball that was too late even for them, Rüdiger headed in to spark a rebellion that would prove brief and incomplete, unlike Simeone’s week.
