This week the Champions and the Spanish teams are preparing for their debut. The Atletico Madrid He will not do so until Thursday, when he will receive the Metropolitano RB Leipzigand in Radio Stadium Night We spoke to one of the only two players in the squad who knows what it’s like to win this tournament: Cesar Azpilicueta.
“I had the joy of winning the Champions League at Chelsea and I hope to repeat it with Atlético”admits a defender from Navarra who aims to qualify for the round of 16 quickly. “The goal is to be in the top eight”he explains. The new Champions League format changes the first phase, which will now be played in a single classification in which the best eight will advance to the round of 16 and the next sixteen will play a playoff.
The red and white team seems to have recovered this season the sensations of the best years of Cholo and the arrival of new faces such as The Normand, Sorloth, Gallagher or Julian Alvarez have raised hopes among the fans. Azpilicueta highlights the adaptation of the Briton, who was his teammate at Chelsea, and the quality of the Argentine. “Julian is a difference-maker, he will contribute a lot to the team”.
At 35, Azpilicueta recognizes that He wants to win a title with Atlético de Madridalthough he does not get involved when it comes to talking about whether or not the team is close to winning the long-awaited Champions League. “We’ll see in May, but we’ll have to prove it on the pitch”he explains on Radioestadio Noche.
He also heaps praise on his coach, Diego Pablo Simeone, which qualifies as “a born competitor” who “wants to win no matter what.”
Another of the most recurrent debates of recent weeks is that of calendaralthough the Navarrese defender explains that the footballers have no choice but to adapt. “There are many agents in football: television, club interests… Those who decide decide and we adapt”.
This will be Azpilicueta’s second season at Atlético and he hopes it will be better than the last. “Hopefully at the end of the season we can look back and see that it was a successful season,” he admits, while taking stock of last season. “In the Cup we lost the tie at home and in the Champions League we saw a bit of everything, when it seemed like we had it, it fell apart”.
