Osasuna – Atlético | Champions League win

A half-destroyed Sadar was the scene of Atlético's resurgence. That Sadar without people and in works, covered by tarpaulins in three of its stands, some brick loomed, while Osasuna and Atlético they tried to fill the void with sweat and voices. “Herreraaa, Saúl, there, there” In postcoronavirus soccer there are no secrets. Everything is heard, nothing can be hidden. Neither the plans nor the intentions that spring from the coaches' heads. “Darko,” Arrasate could be heard, as if answering Cholo. Osasuna had jumped with six changes from Sunday and without daggers, Estupiñán and Vidal, reserved for later, when the game was more tired. Atlético did it with four. If Herrera was the surprise, Arias was charged with a yellow in the 5th minute, Koke and João Félix turned on their flashlight. The Champions League at this point is not something that is dreamed of, but it is achieved, and Atlético has ten finals remaining, Luis LaLiga, to achieve what they now do not have. If in San Mamés he settled in old vices, in El Sadar he came out as expected to Osasuna. Knife between the teeth and to tighten. He had no choice but to run more.

Run more and have Koke, who moved freely ahead of the pivots. The whole game went through his boots. With its light on, the black hole that usually disconnects the center of the rojiblanco field from the strikers was erased and, together with João Felix, he tried to find boulevards towards Costa in the interior corridors. Approach there were, clear occasions were missing. Meanwhile, dominated Osasuna could only do one thing: run after the ball. Run and pray.

The inevitable took 28 minutes to climb to the scoreboard. A combinative goal, which went through many boots before stamping on Rubén's net. Herrera raises his eyes and peers into the uncheck of Lodi, a knife on the left, which gives way behind. Saúl finishes, Lato rejects, but the ball is dead in the area for João Félix to unsheathe his leg. Plof. The hit, dry and high, could only have one end: the net. Accuracy and opportunism. Back better, impossible.

Osasuna tried not to get too much of a taste of Cholo, turning the ball for the rojiblancos for a few minutes into a medicine ball. He went up, between lateral centers and second plays, and linked three consecutive attacks that ended at Oblak's feet. So that it was not said that he had not appeared in a party in which João Félix, Lodi and Koke were fighting to give him his name. Between the three of them they managed to shake off that red dominance to fill the Rubén area with lyric again.. Ten minutes had only lasted control Osasuna, a team that are not easy to handcuff.

The break came between coscorrones (Saúl), jumps punished with yellows (Savic on Aridane) and Atlético going to the house with the mission accomplished. 45 'first good minutes, without laziness or apathy. The new normal. And that he still had Llorente.

When the game returned from rest, Rubén García warmed up while Enric Gallego fought all the balls bypassing Savic and a practically insurmountable Giménez. Osasuna returned with the intention of ripping off the bridles from the legs that Cholo had put on him, but João Félix could return better. With a doublet. The stripes on the shirt had finally been fastened tightly and they shone in the night in Pamplona. The move was born in a Correa until now inconsequential. He leaked a ball to Costa behind the defense that left only Lagarto against Rubén. A generous Costa who, instead of finishing, looked to his left and wrapped the ball in a ribbon to give it to João Félix. Goal. That double.

It was at that moment when Arrasate drew his daggers, Vidal and Estupiñán, perhaps too late, when the bleeding of his team on the scoreboard was already uncontainable. The Cholo responded by taking his Anfield hero off the bench: a comfortable Llorente in the striker suit. Atlético's third, fourth and fifth goal went through their boots. One scored it, two gave them, to Morata (who went up to the scoreboard after VAR review) and Carrasco, while Simeone looked up in Pamplona and saw as possible what for three long months was an obsession. Add three by three, win out six months later, sleep in Champions.