Saúl, the b-side of the best Atlético | Soccer | Sports

Happiness seemed completely installed in Atlético after the epic elimination achieved against Inter Milan. While the fans were still celebrating his attendance at a historic European Cup night, Diego Pablo Simeone could not hide his satisfaction with the feat performed by his footballers. “We had a plan and they followed it,” the Argentine coach wanted to emphasize. His instructions were summarized in not allowing defensive errors, an issue on which he insisted a lot in the previous days, in playing more directly and avoiding elaboration from behind and in placing Llorente and Griezmann as false wingers.

Oblak, who was pigeonholed like a nerd in the penalty shoot-outs due to the memory of the Champions League final lost in Milan under that fateful fate, regained his status as a miracle goalkeeper by stopping the shots of Alexis Sánchez and Klaassen. Savic and Koke, highly questioned for their poor performance, recovered their level. Griezmann, in his reappearance after the ankle injury that occurred at San Siro, once again blessed his return to the club with the tying goal that allowed the team not to decline after Dimarco’s goal. “That’s Atlético, there is no quiet game,” said the Frenchman. At the same time, his friend Memphis had his best match in a year and a half as a red and white.

In the midst of that festive atmosphere and collective euphoria, Saúl, the b-side of Atlético this Wednesday. Affected by his mistake in the penalty shootout, he posted an overwhelming message on his social networks: “Honestly, it is difficult for me to write right now, but just as I write in the good times, I have to do it in the bad times. It’s a shitty moment for me on a sporting level, and I’m aware… I accept all the criticism and not just because of today’s penalty, but because of how I am right now. Exactly, I don’t know what it is, but the only thing they have taught me is to keep working through thick and thin, until I manage to change the situation. Thank you for being there through thick and thin. “Aúpa Atleti.”

Saúl verbalized his feelings in a kind of exorcism of a player who has not raised his head for a long time. There is hardly any trace of that arriving midfielder in whom some of the big clubs in the Premier League were interested. At that time, Simeone saw pieces of his own football self and the club made him one of the highest paid players on the team. His stay on the field in a Champions League match in Leverkusen with a burst kidney is still in the memory of the red and white team.

Saúl began to go into a tailspin when he did not know how to channel and mix well his enlarged character with a nobility that few of those who know him question. Those around him and he himself began to interpret it as a reduction in his hierarchy that Simeone made him play as a left back. Neither his Atlético teammates nor those of the national team were immune to his discomfort and complaints. The situation became unsustainable. Saúl went on loan to Chelsea in the summer of 2021. There he did not recover his level either. Upon his return, the club appreciated a player who accepted his mistakes and was willing to start from scratch.

Simeone, waiting to get him back, has not stopped giving him opportunities. Recently, he regretted that in Granada they disallowed a goal because he thought it would be good for him. The club would have preferred to sell him to lighten the salary bill. However, since there were no convincing offers, even the owner Miguel Ángel Gil Marín got involved so that this year Saúl would wear the number eight again after Griezmann recovered the seven after the departure of João Félix. Gil Marín’s hope was to see that arriving midfielder again, but that has not yet happened, as Saúl himself admitted in his writing on social networks.

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