Atletico, Liverpool meet again in key clash

Last encounter in 2020 was infamous as super-spreader event

Atletico Madrid and Liverpool go head-to-head in the Champions League today in one of the most attractive games in this round of group matches.

Liverpool travel to Madrid on the back of an impressive 5-0 demolition of Watford on Saturday, while Atletico didn’t play at the weekend after their La Liga match at home to Granada was postponed to allow their South American players to recover from their recent international games.

Today’s clash will no doubt bring back memories of the last meeting between the two teams in March 2020 when Atletico progressed to the quarter-finals after an extra time win at Anfield, although the game will also be remembered as an Covid-19 super-spreader event that should never have gone ahead at the start of the pandemic.

A recent preliminary British Parliamentary report said that playing the game in front of a full house when Europe was locking down led to 37 unnecessary deaths.

The 17 days since Atletico’s last match (a 2-0 win at home over Barcelona) mean that midfielder Manuel Llorente, defender Jose Gimenez and forward Matheus Cunha should all be available for coach Diego Simeone after overcoming recent injury problems, reports Xinhua. “We’ll have to see if so many days without a game are going to affect us. Some players have been with their national teams,” commented Atletico midfielder Koke ahead of the game.

Neymar out

Neymar has been ruled out of Paris Saint-Germain’s Champions League Group A clash with RB Leipzig today with an adductor muscle injury, his club said.

PSG said in a medical bulletin yesterday that Neymar “had some pain in his groin since returning from international duty and will undergo more treatment over the next few days before returning to full training.”

The world’s most expensive player scored for Brazil in their 4-1 World Cup qualifying win against Uruguay last Thursday.