Champions League holders, and almost English Premier League champions, travel to the Wanda Metropolitano for a tasty round of 16 Champions League tie on Tuesday night. The form book says Liverpool may be too much for this Atletico Madrid team, but as cup competition has shown time and time again, anyone can beat anyone; and if there’s any team with the defensive prowess to stop Liverpool’s offensive trio of Salah, Mane and Firmino, it’s Diego Simeone’s Atletico Madrid.
Los Rojiblancos come into this match with one win registered in their last seven matches in all competitions. In that run, they’ve been dumped out of the Copa Del Rey in an embarrassing defeat to lower league opposition, and also lost the final of the Spanish Super Cup to their local rivals Real Madrid. That run also includes one win in five La Liga matches. They are currently fourth in the league with 40 points, and are increasingly at risk of missing out on this competition next year, with a crowded battle for Champions League football brewing from 3rd to 7th on the La Liga table.
In the group stages, their performance was not superb either. They qualified in second place behind Juventus, and only won three of their six group matches, losing to Juventus and Bayer Leverkusen, both away, with one draw to boot. In the home matches though, they enjoyed two wins against Lokomotiv Moscow and Leverkusen, and a 2-2 draw against Juventus. So far, in the competition they’ve scored eight goals and conceded five goals.
While Diego Simeone’s men will come into this match as the underdog, they have a good record in the knockout phase of the competition, with four wins in six ties at the same stage. Los Rojiblancos also have a good record against English sides, with just a single loss in 12 visits. Additionally, Atletico’s pedigree in European competition in recent seasons should not be discounted either, with five finals in 10 years – two in the Champions League and three in the Europa League.
Jurgen Klopp’s men are absolutely flying through the EPL currently. They come into this match with nine consecutive wins that has seen them concede zero goals. For perspective, they’ve faced Tottenham, Manchester United and Leicester City in that run: tough oppositions where you would at least expect to see them scoring. Their last match was a one-nil win over Norwich, with Sadio Mane coming off the bench to score a sumptuous goal 12 minutes from fulltime. They now have a 25 point cushion over last season’s EPL champion Manchester City.
In this season’s Champions League competition, they qualified in first place with 13 points from Group E in a group that included Napoli, Salzburg and Genk. They did this even after losing their first match 2-0 away at Napoli; then they dropped points in the 1-1 draw against Napoli at Anfield. So far, they have scored an impressive 13 goals in six matches, but eight goals conceded means they’ve been carved open far too often.
Liverpool are also on an incredible run in the Champions League, having recorded wins in their last 11 two-legged ties in Europe. They’ve also won nine of their last 12 matches in Europe, a run that extends to last season’s run.
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Both sides have only ever met five times in Europe, with their last set of meetings in the Champions League being in the group stage of the 2008/09 competition, with both ties ending in 1-1 draws. They also met in the 2010 Europa League semi-finals, where Atletico progressed on away goals. All these points to the fact that games between both sides have always been tight affairs. Diego Simeone’s team are famed for their grit and defense and do not concede much. Equally, Liverpool have built a solid team on a run of nine consecutive clean sheets in the Premier League. This points to a low-scoring affair.
While under 2.5 goals is the low-risk option on offer, we reckon that under 1.5 goals is also likely. Netbet offers the following odds for our betting tip: under 1.5 goals: 2.9 odds; under 2.5 goals – 1.62 odds.
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