After passing the first learning course, with the ups and downs of adaptation, youth and the jump to the Spanish League, which has proven its complexity, Renan lodi now faces the next step on the left side: consolidation in the
Atlético de Madrid
and in European football.
A year ago, the Brazilian international came to the rojiblanco team as a promising player, one of the most emerging in his position, from the Athletico Paranaense; now he does it reaffirmed as such, but also with the demand that this entails, more in a team of his own ambition, which must compete for everything. Or almost.
From the past preseason to the current one the difference is substantial. It is not the ‘newbie’ that German ‘Mono’ Burgos, then second coach and today already in a new adventure outside of Atlético, and Diego Simeone they insisted again and again with exercises during the preparation so that he assumed each defensive concept, each movement, each choice, within almost private classes.
It is not easy when you are 21 years old – now he is 22 years old last April – and you arrive again at a club like Atlético. “He is a young boy who came from competing in a different league. He arrives here, he finds a lot of information and the need to always win. He has always put his best will and attention to grow and there have been many games in the League and also in the Champions League that he has done well ”, said Diego Simeone last year, after his memorable match against him. Liverpool.
It is the best example of all that can be Renan lodi. But it is also the reference to demand. And not just in a few games, but in almost all of them. There was never any doubt of his tremendous qualities to play there. Now you need more consistency. “To win every day, you have to play like that, because you can do it,” said the coach, after 1-0 at Liverpool in February.
43 GAMES, 39 OF HEADLINE AND 3,514 MINUTES AS LEARNING
“In my first season I saw that LaLiga is a very demanding competition, with many teams that play very well. This year we are working hard again to be able to arrive in the best conditions to have good games, a good season and good championships, ”Lodi said on the club's official website on Monday.
In his first campaign, the full-back has had minutes and games that very few have enjoyed as soon as they arrived at the club in the era Simeone, even more so when the jump is so great in terms of competition and when the experience in Europe is still insignificant, such as when I gave it was booked in the summer of 2019.
The last course he has played 43 games. Just the goalkeeper Jan Oblak (48), the media Saúl Ñíguez (47) and Thomas Partey (46) and forwards Angel Correa (44) and Alvaro Morata (44) have played more number of games than him in the current rojiblanca squad. And 39 have been headline; nine less than Oblak, eight below Saul and the same as Koke and Thomas. All of them are indisputable.
His 3,514 minutes, at the same time, were only surpassed again by Oblak (4,650), Saúl (4,606), Thomas (3,790) and Koke (3,646). By no one else. Besides, the Brazilian full-back, the defender who has participated in more games and more times as the team's starter, has contributed a goal and two assists; perhaps still too little for all he has played, even though full duels drop to 28.
Now start the even more crucial challenge of reaffirmation. In his second preseason with Atlético. “I particularly feel good. Of course, day by day I am optimizing my fitness, getting closer to one hundred percent and wanting to play, “he said this Monday. To play, he will still have to wait for the first friendly, on September 15 against Cádiz in the Ramón de Carranza Trophy.