Atlético has returned from the break due to the coronavirus health crisis in style. The rojiblanco team has added five wins and two draws in very complicated squares (San Mamés and Camp Nou) with a total of 15 goals scored (2.15 per game) and four conceded (0.57 per duel), much better figures than when the championship was stopped in March.
One of the keys of the team is in the rotations that Simeone has carried out. The Argentine coach has squeezed to the maximum the five substitutions that can be carried out during the same game with the new rules of this post-confinement football and He has chosen to change his line-ups between games a lot taking advantage of your wardrobe and the possibility of varying the script of the meeting with the changes to avoid injuries and get everyone plugged.
Footballers like Marcos Llorente or Carrasco, Before the all-time stoppage, they are now two of the most fit players in the squad. But others, who are having much less minutes, are also adding their grain of sand, such as Arias, Vitolo, Herrera or Manu Sánchez. Since LaLiga restart, Simeone averages 5.6 changes to his starting lineup between one match and the next, that is, more than half of the field players.
If Oblak has played every minute, Giménez is the field player with the most participation, playing 571 minutes of Atlético's 630 in this period and returning to its best version. The Uruguayan has started in six of the seven games, and had to enter the last half hour of the match against Levante, where he had been a substitute, to replace an injured Hermoso. He is followed by Saúl, who has also started six games, but it rotated completely in that of Valladolid and before Osasuna and Mallorca it was replaced (524 minutes out of 630).
Atlético's players celebrate a goal by Morata against Mallorca.
JESUS ALVAREZ ORIHUELA (DIARIO AS)
Atlético returned to LaLiga against Athletic with an eleven formed by Oblak, Trippier, Savic, Giménez, Lodi, Thomas, Saúl, Koke, Carrasco, Llorente and Diego Costa. In the second meeting, in El Sadar, Arias, Herrera, Correa and João Félix they supplied Trippier, Thomas, Correa and Llorente. He would return to play three days later with seven changes in the starting lineup, entering Trippier, Hermoso, Manu Sánchez, Thomas, Llorente, Lemar and Morata. Same number of variations that would occur when visiting Levante with Arias, Savic, Lodi, Saúl, Koke, Carrasco and Diego Costa forming part of the titular scheme.
After those seven changes in two consecutive games, against Alavés, Cholo included five variations in his team (Trippier, Giménez, Correa, João Félix and Morata). Five more changes would take place Simeone to try to storm the Camp Nou, with the losses of Savic and Koke by sanction. Arias, Felipe, Carrasco, Llorente and Diego Costa were the changes regarding the babazorro team. Finally, against Mallorca there were six variations in the starting scheme (Trippier, Savic, Manu Sánchez, Koke, João Félix and Morata).
Extreme rotations, so far unusual in Cholo, but which are having a fantastic result, keeping all the staff active, aware that any moment can be the protagonist, falling to a lesser extent in the constant injuries at the beginning of the course and with very clear results, stroking the goal of the Champions League with the tips of your fingers when Atleti stopped in sixth place.