- Arsenal and Ateltico in the Champions League: the question of European referees
- How you can predict the result of a PL game by knowing who the referee is.
By Tony Attwood
I am not sure if it is written into the Spanish constitution or not, but even if it isn’t, the effect is still there. Primarily, only Barcelona and Real Madrid are allowed to win the Spanish League. Others might win, but not very often. It is a statement that, of course, leaves Atletico Madrid feeling a bit out of things. Even though they have a stadium that can hold around 70,000.
But to be fair, they have won the League twice since 2012/13 (which is better than Arsenal of course), the rest of the time coming second, third or fourth. And as we tend to note such things, Manchester City appear to wish to copy this model, although with only one team winning all the time, and an utter disregard for all the financial rules. (I think I may have mentioned this before, but since others have given up on the story, I feel the need to drop in a reminder when I can.)
Anyway, the one thing that does link our opposition tomorrow to Arsenal is that neither side has ever won the Champions League, and I imagine PSG and Bayern were really pissed off that they got drawn against each other in the semis. Although I suspect the winner of that game will just assume the final is a walkover, given that neither Arsenal nor Atletico has ever won this particular pot. The final is in the Puskas Arena in Budapest on 30 May. I am very hopeful, but haven’t yet booked my flight.
Atletico Madrid’s big achievement this season was beating Barcelona in the quarter-final. I suspect, given Arsenal’s lack of form in the Champions League in the past, and the way the English media constantly talk Arsenal down, Atletico will expect these two games to be fairly easy. And in fact, this is one of those times when the media really do us a good turn. Not being aware of the constant, ceaseless and endless anti-Arsenal monologue that we are given by the media, they can quite possibly, actually believe what the English papers say, and thus not really take the game against Arsenal at all seriously.
But what really makes Atletico Madrid stand out this season, however, is that they have scored 34 goals in the Champions League so far. Thus, for example, back in the round of 16 they gave us a spot of amusement by beating Tottenham 5-2 on 10 March, and since then, they have been knocking in round about two goals a game, win or lose. So this is already their highest ever scoring season in the Champs League.
And it means they will expect to score, not having come across a defence like Arsenal’s before. So they could get a bit multo agitato if they don’t score (although I think that might be Italian, not Spanish – languages were never my forte.)
But then a couple of their games were against Tottenham, whose lack of defensive whatnot is a matter of considerable amusement across Europe. At Mad beat the Totts 5-2 at home and then lost to them 3-2 away. So yes, high scoring indeed, but those goals were against Tottenham – a team that has actually managed to concede more than twice as many goals as Arsenal have in the league this season. And of course, for that, they should be congratulated and commemorated, while we might also remember that Arsenal beat them 4-0 last October (and ponder why the media never mention either fact).
For Arsenal, it is two semi-finals in a row in the Champions League, this one following on, of course, from the all-conquering eight straight wins in the league stage. Or to put it another way, in the last 22 games, the Arsenal results are showing won 17, drawn three and lost two. Which is quite good, really. Here are the compartive domestic tables for this season so far….
| Club | P | W | D | L | F | A | GD | Pts |
| Arsenal | 34 | 22 | 7 | 5 | 64 | 26 | +38 | 73 |
| Atletico Madrid | 33 | 18 | 6 | 9 | 56 | 37 | +19 | 60 |
As the table above shows, Arsenal have indeed played one more league game than Atletico Madrid, but the results have gone very much in Arsenal’s favour, as indeed has the goal scoring and the ability to defend. I think the difference in goal difference, which shows Arsenal have twice the goal difference as Atletico Madrid, could be quite a positive factor in these two games – although, as ever, we have to be aware of the level of injuries that detract from Arsenal being able to put out their best team.
But thus far, on this data, I am feeling positive about the results across the two legs.
