[zoric]

Sunday 31 August 2008, 19:00 CET
Estadio Vicente Calderón
Primera División

Referee:
Julián Rodríguez Santiago

Confirmed line-up:
01: Grégory Coupet

02: Giorgios Seitaridis
05: Johnny Heitinga
17: Tomáš Ujfaluši
04: Mariano Pernía

12: Paulo Assunçao

11: Maxi Rodríguez (C)
18: Maniche
20: Simão

07: Diego Forlán
10: Sergio Agüero

Bench:
03: Antonio López
08: Raúl García
09: Luis García
14: Florent Sinama-Pongolle
21: Luis Perea
22: Pablo Ibañez
25: Leo Franco

Not on the squad:
16: Éver Banega
19: Miguel de las Cuevas
23: Juan Valera
24: Ignacio Camacho
27: Ángel Bernabé

 

[zoric]

Ok, so Banega has trained twice with the team and won't be ready to play against Málaga on Sunday. Aguirre said that he'll have to get used to how Atlético plays, so that's the reason why he isn't on the squad for this years league-opener. He could miss the first two games because of this reason, but we'll see in the upcoming weeks. Miguel, Camacho, Valera and Ángel Bernabé weren't selected because of techincal reasons while Motta is on his way out of the club.

Coupet

Seita - Heit - Ufo - Pernía

Paulo

Maxi - Maniche - Simão

Forlán - Kun​

Coupet has been rewarded to start the first league-game instead of Leo after training hard through out the week while Seitaridis will be playing to the right in our defence. Heit and Ufo will both keep their spot while Pernía starts ahead of Antonio López.

The midfield will consist of Assunçao, Maniche, Maxi and Simão while Kun and Forlán are playing upfront.

Antonio Tapía has selected the following players to travel to Madrid on Sunday:

Arnau, Jesús Gámez, Weligton, Cuadrado, Apoño, Calleja, Adrián López, Goitia, Hélder Rosario, Luque, Duda, Eliseu, Miguel Ángel, Manolo Gaspar, Cheli, Nacho, Lolo and Baha.

 

[zoric]

Good stuff in the first half, we've been dominating everything.

Heitinga will be a force in the air this season, he's such a great player to have on set-pieces, the same goes for Ufo, but Heit is superb in this aspect.

Everyone are playing well, this includes Seitaridis even though he's mostly been taking care of his position so far.

Excellent first half, can't remember when I saw us play like this the last time, well, it's Málaga anyways, we kicked their ass 5-0 the last time we played them..

 

[zoric]

Excellent game by Atléti and a great start for our new boys in Primera, especially Heitinga who scored a goal and fixed a penalty. He was great alongside Ufo in defence while Pernía has stepped up his game remarkebly, I can't believe it to be honest but I'm very happy for him :thumbsup:

Our midfield today dominated everything, they were better in all aspects of the game and Maniche had a superb game. Great passing, excellent long-balls and good through-balls, such a shame he couldn't score that header in the end though, he deserves it.

Paulo was everywhere on the pitch and helped out our defence in a great manner. Simão one of the best players alongside Kun, Forlán and Maniche while Maxi had a day off finish-wise, still a good game from him.

I'm very happy Luis García stepped up his game today, very good when he replaced Forlánazo while Sinama-Pongolle showed good intentions and got a great pass from Luis García to score on, excellent finish btw :thumbsup:

All in all, we couldn't get a better start..

4-0 in two consecutive matches

This is starting to remind of last season when we were crushing teams like Racing and Zaragoza with 4-0 for fun.

 

[zoric]

Atlético Madrid - Málaga

1-0 Johnny Heitinga (26')
2-0 Diego Forlán (38')
3-0 Diego Forlán (43')
4-0 Florent Sinama-Pongolle (80')

 

[zoric]

I think Simãos excellent delivery on set-pieces is benefitting Johnny, he's excellent in the air and good in the box. An extra threat on set-pieces which is great and not only that, Ufo and Heit are very good defensively too and that's where we've suffered somewhat with Pablo and Perea earlier.