Espanyol has been flirting with relegation for some time. The days go by and the Blue and Whites are still installed in the dangerous zone, without being able to look up. The break for the World Cup is just around the corner and the objective of Diego Martínez's men in the two remaining league games is to face that parenthesis with the peace of mind of not occupying any of the three cursed positions.
The first of these duels will be in an always complicated place such as the Metropolitano against an Atlético de Madrid wounded after the European failure and being irregular in the domestic championship. However, Diego Martínez was ambitious in the preview by assuring that the Blue and Whites can "beat any team", since the sensations they transmit are better than the results. “If we only talk about the points, we would jump off a ravine. We must work. We could have four more points and we would be in a very good situation”.
If Espanyol arrives at the Metropolitano at a very delicate moment, for Atlético it could be nothing less than the worst since Simeone took command of the team twelve seasons ago, off the hook in the League and outside European competitions.
With the increasingly strong rumors pointing to a possible dismissal of the Argentine coach, the entity's CEO and main shareholder, Miguel Ángel Gil Marín, had to come out with a public letter posted on the club's website on Friday night denying that Cholo is in doubt, remembering how much Atlético has grown in these ten years under the leadership of the Argentine. “We are in the best moment of our 120-year history. The team has played the last ten editions of the Champions League consecutively, something that only eight clubs have achieved”, he said.
The letter ended with an appeal to the partners: “If now it's time to suffer, let's do it, but together. This club and this team have shown the ability to always get up and faster after each fall, this time should not be different. We cannot allow any external factor to disunite us instead of strengthening our ties. Unity is our great strength and we cannot lose it”.
In his press conference yesterday, Simeone, who announced the return to the squad of Lemar and Marcos Llorente, assured that he understood that the fans are upset: “The fans have to demand more from me; I never went to ask for anything. I understand and live in my way of living. You have to give, the whole group has to give more because people are going to be there”. The Argentine had good words for Espanyol: “Against Espanyol we have always had short results. They have a great coach who manages the teams very well. They will try to make us nervous and they will try to make the minutes run; We will have to play the match we have in mind”.
The nervousness in Atlético is palpable in a banner that the fans hung this week in the field of El Cerro del Espino where the colchoneros train. The text was as follows: "The fans at the head of a worthy team." “This is like a family, in the family we usually have fights over the years with your cousins, your wife, brothers... But then if there is a problem there is a meeting and everything is solved, if we feel close you can see why calls a family and we are a family, it is time to be all together, "added Simeone.
