This is how Griezmann left Atlético without a single shot on goal against Inter and frustrated Simeone's plan | Soccer

At San Siro, for the first time this season, Atlético closed a game without finishing on goal. Part of the annoyance that Diego Pablo Simeone showed in his appearance before the press had to do with his disappointment with the problems his players had in generating offensive play. “We didn’t have important situations in the first half, in the second we got a little more excited and had some more dangerous plays. We couldn’t have as many goal situations as in the last games,” the Argentine coach reflected resignedly.

In the attack plan designed by Simeone to try to hurt Inter, the figure of Antoine Griezmann was key. The French attacker was told to look for the backs of Çalganoglou, Mkhitharyan and Barella. El Cholo understood that in that space was one of the weak points of Simone Inzaghi’s system. The height of the event invited the best version of Griezmann to be exploited, who remained in a low profile in the last matches. The little weight he had in the game once again made evident the dependence that Atlético has on him. The team greatly accuses its shortcomings. He did not leave a threatening action throughout the game, neither in that weak area of Inter that his coach had marked for him, nor in the area. With a quarter of an hour left, Griezmann left the field without a shot on goal. He sprained his ankle and was replaced by Correa. “A coach I had told me that the ankle is noble,” Simeone resolved with a certain coldness when he was asked about the Frenchman’s mishap at the Movistar microphones. “He had twisted his ankle and let’s hope it was just a sprain,” he later explained briefly in the press room. The club confirmed this Wednesday that the forward suffers a moderate ankle sprain. This rules him out for this Sunday’s match against Almería and is a serious doubt for the second leg of the Cup semi-finals against Athletic, in San Mamés, next Thursday, February 29.

Hoping that he would recover his best level at San Siro, Simeone did not give Griezmann a single minute last Saturday against Las Palmas. Chosen to be the creative footballer, his game summed up that of his team. He made the cut in his off-ball work and had a mediocre performance when the ball landed at his feet. He could not shake off the feeling of exhaustion and lack of freshness that has overcome him in recent weeks. Simeone was waiting for that player capable of creating and finishing and he did not appear as much as he would have liked to threaten Inter more. Griezmann couldn’t grease or sharpen the attack and Atlético paid for it. He appears unable to change gears and with less ability to flit around the entire attack front.

“We controlled the game for many periods of time, but in the first half we created few chances, or almost none to be clearer. In the second it improved a little,” Simeone stressed again with an air of dissatisfaction with his team’s offensive performance. “We needed to create more in the last 15 meters,” said Axel Witsel. “Surely to turn the tie around we have to be perfect in defense and we are going to have to do much more offensively than we have done,” he added to Oblak.

The Frenchman’s blackout and the absence of a nine until Morata came on drew an Atlético team that was not very sharp in attack to be able to overthrow Inter’s defensive system. The commitment to Llorente as a striker only resulted in covering up Bastoni’s release of the ball. He was barely able to break into space face-to-face. The feeling conveyed was that when he managed to break the Inter barrier and approached the vicinity of Sommer’s area, there was no pure finisher to resolve the crosses into the area.

Inzaghi’s team registers an average of 0.5 goals per game. History also says that Inter never lost a tie in which they had to defend a 1-0 win in the first leg. On eight occasions he found himself in that situation and on all of them he managed to advance to the round. “Let’s see if in the return we can give a little more than we have given to be able to compete as the competition demands,” Simeone warned, once again revealing his dissatisfaction with the match that his players played. Griezmann included.