The Benfica stadium, Estadio da Luz, still
holds a bad memory for Atletico, who lost in the UCL final to Madrid, but
Simeone is not perturbed.
It looked like Atletico were going to escape with a 1-0 win at the home of Benfica, but an injury time goal from Ramos, sparked a 4-1 victory for Los Blancos.
Simeone must now travel to Benfica and hope they can revenge the 2-1 first leg loss and top the table.
“Benfica played a great game in Madrid. It’s a team with interesting references up front. They are in the place that we want and we’ll try to win the game,” he said.
“We have to be aware of the players that can create us problems. [Nicolas] Gaitan is one, Renato [Sanches] is another of Benfica’s very interesting youngsters – but all the team has quality.
“Our aim is always to win and of course it would be good to end in first but it guarantees us nothing.
“We are back in a stadium where we have experienced important things – good, by playing a Champions League final and bad by losing it. But that’s life and we have to keep on going.”
Atleti are set to come up against a familiar face in the shape of Raul Jimenez, who swapped the Vicente Calderon for the Portuguese champions in August after just one season.
“We did nothing wrong with Raul Jimenez, on the contrary,” Simeone added.
“We were very happy with him but you must appreciate he had to compete with [Antoine] Griezmann, [Fernando] Torres and [Mario] Mandzukic and that is very competitive.
“It’s no wonder he makes goals and what is happening makes us very happy because he is a player who left us good memories.”
It looked like Atletico were going to escape with a 1-0 win at the home of Benfica, but an injury time goal from Ramos, sparked a 4-1 victory for Los Blancos.
Simeone must now travel to Benfica and hope they can revenge the 2-1 first leg loss and top the table.
“Benfica played a great game in Madrid. It’s a team with interesting references up front. They are in the place that we want and we’ll try to win the game,” he said.
“We have to be aware of the players that can create us problems. [Nicolas] Gaitan is one, Renato [Sanches] is another of Benfica’s very interesting youngsters – but all the team has quality.
“Our aim is always to win and of course it would be good to end in first but it guarantees us nothing.
“We are back in a stadium where we have experienced important things – good, by playing a Champions League final and bad by losing it. But that’s life and we have to keep on going.”
Atleti are set to come up against a familiar face in the shape of Raul Jimenez, who swapped the Vicente Calderon for the Portuguese champions in August after just one season.
“We did nothing wrong with Raul Jimenez, on the contrary,” Simeone added.
“We were very happy with him but you must appreciate he had to compete with [Antoine] Griezmann, [Fernando] Torres and [Mario] Mandzukic and that is very competitive.
“It’s no wonder he makes goals and what is happening makes us very happy because he is a player who left us good memories.”
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