The first roll of thunder hit with two minutes left on the last-ever European night at the Vicente Calderón. The rain poured off the roof and through it too, swirling in the sky. Soaked, they sang through the storm. They sang high in the north stand, where Real Madrid's supporters celebrated being in the final, and they sang everywhere else, where Atlético Madrid's fans celebrated just being. On the touchline, Diego Simone frantically punched the air and conducted the crowd. Out, but not down. Not beaten, either. Not this time, the last time.
Before this game, a huge mosaic stretched along the open side of the stadium had declared: "Proud not to be like you [Real]". After it, Simeone echoed those words. When he eventually appeared, he was beaming. "Why?" he was asked. "I'm happy, proud," he said. The supporters had been too: for the fourth time in four years, Real had knocked them out of Europe, but the buildup to this game had been about identity, loyalty, emotion, something less tangible, not just results. "Tell me how it feels," the Bernabéu banner had asked; Atlético had responded by telling them that they wouldn't understand. They appeared determined to prove as much, the noise deafening.
At the end, the players removed their shirts. Simeone celebrated as if his team had won – which, he later reminded everyone, they had. Real danced in a circle, disappeared to the dressing room and then came back again to applaud their supporters, laying their flags on the turf. Atlético came back out too, by popular demand. The final whistle had not been heard, lost in the noise, all the applause, the rendition of an anthem soon to be obsolete: “I’m off to Manzanares, to the Vicente Calderón stadium,” booms the opening bar.
It hasn't always been a happy place to be, particularly against their neighbours, but it was home. Karim Benzema made Real's 99th goal here to end it, Isco finishing it off. He had his Fernando Redondo moment, destined to be played over, each time better than the last, to take Real to Cardiff.
"Did you expect that?" Zidane was asked. "No," he said. "I asked him how he had got out of there – and he didn't know." Somehow, Karim Benzema escaped away from all three centre-backs – one for each goal that Atlético Madrid now needed, forced to start all over again. Somehow, he had slipped through their fingers, taking their hopes of reaching the final with him. For a while the impossible had actually seemed possible.
"Yes, we can!" Atlético's fans had chanted as Antoine Griezmann stood over the penalty and when he scored they allowed themselves to believe that they really could. It had not convinced, the ball going in off the goalkeeper's palm, but maybe that convinced them even more. Maybe their luck had changed, after all. Only a quarter of an hour had gone and they already had two of the three they needed to take this to extra time. Just before half-time, a moment to think, it was gone again. The tie was over.
They say it is the hope that kills you, yet if there was something cruel in this Atlético had built it up to be about more than the result, whether they went to Cardiff or not. When the goal went in Isco cupped his ears and Cristiano Ronaldo lifted a finger to his mouth, but they would not be silenced. The night before, Atlético's fans had gathered at the team's hotel with fireworks and flares, appealing for them to give every drop of blood. Captain Gabi Fernández had tears in his eyes. The next night the players responded; more even than respect, there was celebration. Pride in the way that they had fallen.
“A magical move from Benzema took our dream away,” Gabi said. Simeone called the goal “extraordinary, but that’s football.” Football has often been cruel, especially in Europe against Real. After the first leg, Simeone said it is “wonderful” – which was why his team could turn this round. But in the end, they could not. It happened again – no one has ever been knocked out by the same side four years running – yet afterwards he said it had been a “magical” last night, a fitting farewell. This did not hurt like Milan. He had talked about that as a mourning but called this marvellous.
Was this the emotion of the last night, though? What his side has done over the last five and half years is astonishing, winning the Europa League, the Copa del Rey and La Liga, reaching two finals, a semi-final and a quarter-final. At the end, it felt like it was not just the end but The End.
After all, it is legitimate to ask if Atlético really keep overachieving or if things will ever be the same again. Assuming it will be finished in time (and that is quite the assumption given the state of the worksite right now), Atlético move in August. The Wanda Metropolitan will be a better stadium, but it won’t be the same. Way out on the other side of the city, can it really feel like home? Another question was how they would react to another defeat; would there be the stomach to rebel once more? Would he wish to continue? Could this team really be taken on? That competing at this level has become “normal” does not make it normal.
Simeone suggested that this had provided the answer, although he did hint at one problem – age – when he said that he wished he could clone his players, a theme he returned to. There was also something about the emotion with which he talked that felt like some sort of closure, and he talked in retrospective tone of the last five and half years. And yet he also said: “There has been huge growth, but there are steps before us still – and we must take them. There is a bright future.” He also insisted: “Emotions are transmitted: the people who were here today will be there tomorrow at the Metropolitano. It will be the same passion, enthusiasm, desire; that’s non-negotiable. Our home was the Calderón, it will be the Metropolitano.”
The Calderón, their home, will soon be gone, thunder and lightning accompanying its final moments in Europe, symbolic somehow. Atlético were beaten, but at least they had enjoyed a last waltz. “I’m proud: we competed yet again, as we have for five and a half years; it makes me emotional every day,” Simeone said. “We were 3-0 and some thought that when we said we could come back it was just words, but the path we took was wonderful. Those 20-25 minutes will be in the history of the club, the atmosphere. This was a magical Calderón night that will be in people’s memories for ever.”
(Guardian service)
