The current wisdom suggests Atletico de Madrid is an impossible team to figure out.
Really, it’s the opposite. Take a look at what it did the week before, and then predict the exact opposite – it’s your best bet.
At the Vicente Calderon on Feb. 14, Atletico handed Barcelona its first league defeat of the season, 2-1. [...]

In what promises to be an entertaining match between two attacking teams, Sevilla will take on Atletico de Madrid in this season’s Copa del Rey final.
Sevilla – conquerors of holders Barcelona and Deportivo la Coruna in the prior two rounds – had a tough go of it in Wednesday’s semifinal second leg at Getafe. Holding [...]

Two of Spain’s biggest clubs are one step away from the Copa del Rey final.
In Wednesday’s first leg semifinal, Sevilla defeated Getafe at the Sanchez Pizjuan, 2-0. Atletico de Madrid upped the ante today, romping over Racing Santander, 4-0, at the Vicente Calderon.
Sevilla and Atletico will have to defend those leads on the road in [...]

If you are looking for more certainty as to which clubs will advance to the knock-out round, Tuesday’s UEFA Champions League results did not help. Draws by the leaders of Groups B, C, and D drew trailing teams closer to the top, and while all the names at the top remain in the same, [...]

When juxtaposed, UEFA Champions League Groups C and D show us the best and worst about the competition’s group phase, with neither group having a monopoly on the good qualities.
The difference in the groups’ depth highlights the problem Champions League accepts with four-team groups. When a tournament spreads its teams into many small groups, [...]

Groups A through D resume UEFA Champions League group play on Tuesday, as the tournament’s initial stage enters its home-stretch: the reverse fixtures; second-half of the schedule; the point after which we can start comparing teams with more certainty.
To this point, we can only be reasonably confident that (from these groups) Chelsea, Porto, and [...]

It may seem hard to believe, but Atletico de Madrid has won a La Liga game this year.
The night was Oct. 3. Zaragoza was visiting the Vicente Calderon.
Having gone the first five league games without a win (three draws and two ugly losses to Malaga and Barcelona), manager Abel Resino was on the hot seat.

As [...]

It was not as big an upset as Tuesday’s result at Camp Nou, but Milan’s late goal at the Santiago Bernabéu – handing Real Madrid their first home loss of the Galactícos 2.0 era – was enough of a shock to knock Rubin Kazan out of the headlines, earning the Italians a 3-2 win.
Perhaps as [...]

Between them, Real Madrid and AC Milan have 16 European titles, finishing second another seven times. In the 54-year history of the European Cup and Champions League, roughly two-fifths of the finals have featured one of these clubs. Milan’s presence has been slightly less frequent, having made eleven finals appearances (winning seven), but [...]

You’re going to hear a lot about FC Zürich over the next two days (and rightfully so), but they were not the only little-club-that-could on Wednesday. They were just the most successful. Today, two other clubs that would not have been in this competition last season almost made a name for themselves.
In Bordeaux, [...]