It is 16 years since the last eight of the Uefa Champions League featured no club from Spain’s La Liga. That blip was swiftly corrected and in the decade and a half that followed, Real Madrid and Barcelona won it four times each and Atletico Madrid twice finished runners-up. If any country can be said to have dominated club football’s principal competition this century, it would be Spain.
But over the next two nights, that status is at risk. La Liga's leaders, Atletico, confront a 1-0 deficit when they go to London on Wednesday for the second leg of their last-16 tie against a Chelsea unbeaten in their 12 matches under new manager, Thomas Tuchel. Neighbours Real have no more than a toe in the quarter-finals by virtue of the 1-0 first-leg lead over Atalanta they will defend this evening.
In the rear-view mirror are the exits of Barcelona and Sevilla, who conceded 10 goals between them in their last-16 ties against Paris Saint-Germain and Borussia Dortmund respectively.
Ranged in front of Madrid are the statistics that advertise Atalanta’s potency: only Serie A leaders Inter Milan have outscored Atalanta in Italy’s top division. Their aggregate score from their last four away games in Europe is 11-3 in their favour. Unlike in the first leg against Madrid, they also intend to have a full eleven on the pitch from start to finish at the Alfredo Di Stefano stadium
The sending off of Remo Freuler in Bergamo, with just 18 minutes on the clock, meant Atalanta were obliged to retreat more than is their natural instinct. But as they conceded the initiative, they found Madrid had few constructive ideas about what to do with it until an opportunist shot from distance by Ferland Mendy that, four minutes from the final whistle in Italy, finally brought a goal and some relief to a laboured display.
In mitigation, Madrid were deep in an injury crisis then, missing Karim Benzema, their most reliable finisher, captain Sergio Ramos, Dani Carvajal and Eden Hazard. Alas for Hazard, his absences have almost ceased to count as news. When the Belgian did not appear at practice on Monday morning, a weary feeling of deja vu came over the Madrid head coach Zinedine Zidane.
Hazard had made his first appearance since the end of January in Saturday's 2-1 win against Elche, 15 minutes as a substitute coinciding with Madrid completing their comeback from 1-0 down. It was a brief cameo of the type that his Madrid career has mostly been reduced to in the 20 months since he arrived, for over €130 million ($155m), from Chelsea.
Hazard has started only eight games in La Liga and Champions League combined this season. In 2019-20, his contribution to Madrid’s league title was a mere 14 starts and one goal. Most of the lost time then was spent recuperating from a fracture in his foot, but there were muscle problems, too, as there have been again in the current campaign.
Zidane, who pushed for the recruitment of Hazard, sounded exasperated as he spoke to reporters. "Something is going on," he said. "I can't explain it. In his career before he was never injured, or very seldom. I want to be positive and think this injury is a minor one, but he won't play against Atalanta."
He was unsure of the specific diagnosis. “We have very competent people here who are right on top of all the players’ conditions, so we will find out what is happening. We all want to help, and with all my heart I want to see him being the great player he is.”
The better news is that Ramos returned at the weekend from a seven-week lay-off and Benzema is back and among the goals, with a brace against Elche and the equaliser in the 1-1 draw against Atletico the previous weekend. Zidane cannot, though, count on a pair of trusted warriors, the injured Carvajal and Casemiro, who serves a suspension.
Freuler is banned for an Atalanta eager to continue their whirlwind romance with the Champions League. They took part in it for the first time last season, and, at the last-16 stage, recorded a stunning 8-4 aggregate victory over Valencia before being knocked out by an injury-time goal in the quarter-final against Paris Saint-Germain.
“We are not going to Madrid to sightsee,” said Gian Piero Gasperini, the Atalanta head coach, “although it’s a difficult first-leg score to overcome. We couldn’t play our true game last time because we weren’t 11 against 11. It’s not over and we will give it a real go.”
