After the game against Barcelona, Simeone gave everyone two full days off.
Not only because of the victory over Barcelona, but also because Atletico Madrid has surpassed Valencia, which lost this round, in points and advanced to third place in the standings.
If this ranking is maintained until the end of the season, Atletico Madrid will not need to play in the qualifying rounds next season and can directly participate in the Champions League group stage next season.
For Simeone, who was only ranked 10th when he took over the team, this is naturally great news.
In addition, everyone is very tired from the two-front battle in the league and Europa League recently, so Simeone gave everyone a chance to take two days off.
On February 29, Switzerland played a friendly match with Argentina. Messi scored his first hat trick for the Argentina national team, raising his total number of goals in 2012 to 17 and almost catching up.
Qiao Anchen, only one goal away.
Qiao Anchen scored 18 goals and Messi scored 17. This phenomenon has aroused heated discussions among the media and fans.
Because Qiao Anchen and Messi have scored the most goals since entering 2012, leaving them far behind the players behind them.
Many forwards cannot score 17 goals in a year. As a result, Qiao Anchen and Messi only played for 2 months and reached such a high number of goals. It is really amazing.
Although Qiao Anchen is more efficient than Messi, Messi has national team competitions, while Qiao Anchen does not.
For example, in this friendly match that was classified as an international A-level event, Messi scored a hat trick, raising the total number of goals to 17 and catching up again.
But Qiao Anchen did not play for the national team.
The two seem to have a tendency to make a mark on the 2012 goalscoring list. Everyone is very excited and looking forward to it.
Of course, for the entire year, it has only ended in February, which is still very early, but there are only a few signs.
Whether it can really present a situation where you are chasing each other and twin stars shine depends on the condition of the two people, their durability, whether they will be injured, etc.
Just when Qiao Anchen was ambitious and wanted to continue scoring in the next game and maintain the record of consecutive goals, Falcao suffered a muscle strain during training and had to rest for a few days and was destined to miss the next game.
This is undoubtedly bad news for Atletico Madrid.
Although Qiao Anchen's scoring efficiency is higher than Falcao's recently, Falcao can not only score goals, but he also plays a great role as a tactical center, giving Qiao Anchen a lot of cover.
With Falcao's presence, the opponent cannot concentrate on defense and deal with Qiao Anchen alone.
If Falcao's tactical deterrence in the opponent's penalty area is missing, and the opponent's defense concentrates its efforts on Qiao Anchen, can Qiao Anchen still score?
That's an unknown number.
But no matter what, it is a foregone conclusion that Falcao will miss the game, and Simeone can only consider changing the formation.
At 22:00 on the evening of March 3, the 26th round of La Liga Atletico Madrid's away game against Sevilla officially started at Sevilla's home stadium Pizjuan.
In the last round of the league, it was precisely because Atletico Madrid defeated Barcelona at home and Sevilla defeated Valencia away that Atletico Madrid surpassed Valencia in the standings from 4th to 3rd.
name.
Speaking of which, Sevilla has done Atletico Madrid a big favor!
However, it is obvious that Atletico Madrid will not regard Sevilla as a friend because of this, and Sevilla will not think so either.
In this game, both sides still have to continue to defeat their opponents and strive for victory.
Especially Atletico Madrid, under Simeone's command and the outstanding performance of Joan Chen, Falcao and others, the Sheets Army entered the 2012 competition with a complete victory record.
Even Cosmos Barcelona lost at their feet. Everyone was full of confidence. Even if it was an away game and even if Falcao was still missing due to injury, Atletico Madrid was not passive at all and played very actively.
Tactically, Atletico Madrid was not conservative at all and still had a 433 formation. Although Falcao was absent due to injury, Simeone did not change the overall formation and still played three forwards.
But this time, Qiao Anchen was pushed to the center position, with Arda Turan and Salvio assisting him on both sides.
Although Qiao Anchen has poor header skills, according to Simeone's arrangement, as long as Qiao Anchen, who has excellent shooting skills, enters the penalty area, he can attract the maximum defensive attention of the opponent and create opportunities for Turan and Salvio.
At the same time, if you get a chance to shoot in the penalty area, with Qiao Anchen's shooting skills, the chance of scoring is also high.
After all, there is no watertight defense in the world. As long as the opponent is a little careless and allows Qiao Anchen to get a chance to shoot, it is possible to score.
Of course, Simeone's 433 formation is not an offensive formation in the traditional sense. His midfield three are all midfielders who are good at defense.
Therefore, Simeone's formation is not a massive attack without any structure, but a planned and layered attack, or a high-position press, and the tactical thinking is still based on counterattack after defense.
Although Sevilla has won two consecutive games in the last two games, its overall performance this season is actually poor. It is currently ranked 11th in the standings, worse than Atletico Madrid before the coaching change.
Therefore, if Sevilla wants to qualify for the top six European competitions, they must attack. What's more, this is their home court, and their opponent Atletico Madrid is still missing their main center Falcao.
With such a good opportunity, how could Sevilla not attack? Even if they knew that Atletico Madrid's tactics were defensive counterattacks, they couldn't do anything about it. They couldn't have a friendly discussion with Atletico Madrid and end up with a goalless draw, right?
What's more, Atletico Madrid may not necessarily agree.
With Falcao absent and Qiao Anchen playing center forward for the first time, many people felt that Atletico Madrid might not go well in this game.
Who would have known that in the 9th minute of the game, Sevilla's midfield pass made a mistake. Atletico Madrid midfielder Gabi saw the opportunity and flew to intercept the ball halfway, successfully scooping the ball away.
The ball that Gabi shoveled away fell at the feet of Koke on the side.
Koke looked up and made a decisive pass, sending the ball into the gap in the middle of the front court, where Qiao Anchen got the ball.
When Gaby flew to tackle the ball, Qiao Anchen and right winger Salvio were already ready to counterattack.
Seeing that Gabi had successfully tackled the ball and the ball fell to Koke's feet, Qiao Anchen immediately used his speed, reaction, off-ball movement, etc. to run into the gap, and then successfully received Koke's pass.
Then Qiao Anchen dribbled the ball forward while observing Salvio's movement.