Atlético Madrid fans back Simeone and blame Berta
Atlético Madrid produced a remarkable comeback to defeat Valencia 3-2 on Saturday night, with the fans backing Diego Simeone and chanting his name throughout. Given that Atleti’s title defence hasn’t gone to plan and given that the team meekly exited two cup competitions in the space of a few days, there had been some suggestions that the Argentine should leave. The fans want him to stay, though, and are instead pinning the blame for the poor start to 2021/22 on sporting director Andrea Berta.
What it means to him.
Te quiero, @Simeone!❤️🤍 pic.twitter.com/lq7PKmIcbz— Atletico Universe (@atletiuniverse) January 22, 2022
The Italian took over the sporting department of the club in the summer of 2017 and did well to navigate a period of evolution, as the heroes of the 2013/14 championship aged out of the squad and as new blood was brought in. After the 2019/20 season that Simeone famously labelled “our year of transition”, Atleti hit the ground running the next year and won the title. That 2020/21 squad was a solid one.
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Atlético’s problem: Too few and too old
But, the current squad isn’t fit for purpose, even with Saturday’s victory, and there are two key stats that reflect this. One is that Atlético Madrid have the smallest squad in the entire division, with just 21 players registered with the first team. The other is that they have the sixth-oldest squad, with an average age of 28.
This explains the problems suffered by the Colchoneros. Their starting XI is still very strong and they arguably have the best attacking front in the club’s history, but their ageing squad is prone to injuries and just one or two absences can leave them stretched.
Take central defence, for example. Even though Atleti often play with a back three, Berta greenlighted starting the season with just four centre-backs, two of whom are over 30 in Felipe and Stefan Savić and one of whom is injured every few weeks in José María Giménez. Throw in the fact that the club knew Savić had a four-game UEFA suspension, and this approach seems beyond self-destructive.
Across the squad, there are similar scenarios and Berta doesn’t seem to have learned from the mistakes of the summer, having this January sanctioned the sale of Kieran Tripper even though the only right-back currently on the books is Šime Vrsaljko, another player dealing with the ghosts of injuries past.
In Berta’s defence…
Many mistakes have been made by Berta in designing this squad. But, it should also be kept in mind that the Italian is working with at a club where expectations are growing at a faster rate than the budget.
While the official 2021/22 budgets haven’t all been released yet, taking last season’s as an example you can see that Atleti had a budget of €442, while Real Madrid had €825m and Barcelona €795. Although Barça’s has been cut for 2021/22, it remains larger than what Atleti have to work with.
The way Berta has worked around such limitations during his five years in charge has been to prioritise quality over quantity. Going by Transfermarkt’s numbers, the players in Atleti’s squad have an average market value of €30.06m, which is larger than the equivalent at Real Madrid and Barcelona. The problem is that the Blancos and the Blaugrana have squad depth, whereas Atlético have had to sacrifice this in order to build a starting line-up that can compete with their title rivals. Last year, when the injury bug didn’t bite too hard, this was fine. This season, it has been a disastrous policy.
