Atlético are top of La Liga, despite having played one game more than Barça, as a result of their participation in the recent Club World Cup.
Not an easy game mind, as they have to travel to El Molinón on February 17 to play Sporting.
But as things stand, Atlético are league leaders, greatly down to their ability to grind out results.
They’ve struggled at times during their matches but have managed to see them out due to their solid defending and great collective spirit.
They are still looking to find out their best attacking option with players coming in and out of the team to accompany the one guarantee in Griezmann (that said despite his poor game yesterday) but they keep picking up points.
To get to the top of the table yesterday they relied on two sources of energy: that of Espanyol and that of Thomas. Espanyol made things difficult for Barça, in a game which at times was like urban warfare and which deprived the NSM trident of their usual amount of scoring occasions.
It has to be said that they were fortunate too. For Atleti, Thomas once again unblocked play as he did at Vallecas, in a game in which Atlético were struggling to resolve.
I don’t understand why Simeone under uses this player who did so well at Mallorca and AlmerÃa and who has been instrumental in two wins in four days for his team.
Next up are Real Madrid, who have a chance to go level on points with Barça, leaving aside their game in hand.
BenÃtez is well remembered at Mestalla and we’ll see a strange situation with complimentary banners at an away ground whilst his name receives a resounding boo at the Bernabeu when announced on the pre-match tannoy.
At Valencia he did a great job and even claimed that he was an ‘antimadridista’, after one particular game at the Bernabeu where he stated post-match, “here one has to do twice the work to reap half the reward”, so it’s quite normal that Mestalla faithful miss him.
Today he faces a different challenge: that of convincing Real Madrid fans.