Posted by Joseph Zucker

In my season preview for Atlético Madrid, my expert analysis had predicted a 14th-place finish for the club. By expert analysis, I mean I literally picked a number out of a hat. It just was a representation of how little good it does to try and plan out how the season will play out for the Rojiblancos. Really though, that prediction is probably the most accurate preseason projection made about the club. Atlético sits in 11th position on 13 points.

With this atrocious start comes renewed calls for the sacking of manager Gregorio Manzano. It is quite the turnaround from where the club was early in the season. In the first four league matches, Atlético looked like a club that would have a very good shot at a Champions League spot. Manzano was looked upon as a genius and the man who would finally return the club to the promised land, or at least to consistent success. He was a calm, stabilizing force in the dressing room and his press conferences were very open and welcoming.

But that all started to change following the Barcelona match. It seems that with every result Atlético reaches a lower point. And just when you think that maybe the winds have begun to change again—following wins against Zaragoza and Udinese—they lose to 10-man Getafe. I just want that to sink in a little bit. Down to 10 men for 62 minutes, Getafe were able to put three past Atlético. The Rojiblancos dominated possession, with 67%, but only managed to get five shots on target.

Sporting director José Luis Caminero has said that Manzano’s job is safe, for now. It all really seems to depend on the next two fixtures, though: home at Levante and away to Real Madrid. It’s hard to see Atleti getting anything in the Bernabéu. But luckily, Atlético’s home form has been much better at home, so taking three points from Levante is a possibility.

I don’t really see Manzano lasting the rest of the season, though. The best comparison I could think of is Roy Hodgson’s reign at Liverpool. Hodgson had arguably his best results with smaller clubs. He was able to get a club like Fulham to finish mid-table in the Premier League and runner-up in the Europa League and that was a great finish for them. Then he goes to Liverpool and we all kind of know how that played out. That’s pretty much Manzano’s career path. Granted Sevilla shouldn’t be considered a small club, most of his time spent has been with clubs like Mallorca and Racing Santander, the lower rungs of the La Liga ladder. Much like Hodgson, I expect Manzano to out of a job by the end of the year. He had only signed a one-year contract prior to this season so it was difficult to see him managing past this year anyway.

The bigger problem is, who do you bring in? On the “This is Atleti” podcast, this topic came up and two of the higher-profile names were Louis van Gaal and Rafael Benitez. Either one of these men would not do anything to stop the train wreck that is Atlético’s season. I don’t see Benitez taking the job, although he is obviously Spanish. After he complained so vociferously about Liverpool’s troubles behind the scenes, there isn’t any way I could possibly see him coming to a club with a situation that is even worse in comparison to how it was at Anfield. I don’t see van Gaal showing a lot of interest, either. I also don’t see van Gaal being able to get the players to listen to him. He was of course the manager who dropped his pants at Bayern Munich to show he literally had the balls to drop any player he wanted. Both van Gaal and Benitez are from the same kind of mold as managers. They’re tacticians who only really worry about the game. They’re not concerned with building relationships with the players or really seeing them as anything other than mindless chess pieces to be moved according to the situation on the field. This approach wouldn’t really work at Atlético. I think the players would just tune out a manager who simply barked orders at them all day. They need a José Mourinho-type who, while certainly very demanding, will coddle the players to an extent and tell them they are the best in the world, even though that is far from the truth.

No matter who comes in, chances are at this point next season, there will be another change in managers. The revolving door will continue to swing at the Calderón. Here are the list of men who have managed Atlético since 1998: Arrigo Sacchi, Radomir Antić, Claudio Ranieri, Radomir Antić (again), Fernando Zambrano, Marcos Alonso, Garcia Cantarero, Luis Aragonés, Gregorio Manzano, César Ferrando, Carlos Bianchi, José Murcia, Javier Aguirre, Abel Resino, Quique Sánchez Flores, and Gregorio Manzano (again).

This is obviously not the way you build long-term stability and the club has really suffered because of it. It’s really hard to put into words how toxic this club is. Many football fans are familiar with what Hicks/Gillett did to Liverpool, but this really is a much worse situation. These are systemic problems from the top on down that have been going on for decades. The worst part is, it’s not going to get any better in the future. The debt isn’t just going to disappear and someone like John Henry isn’t going to save supporters from the horrible ownership. Certainly the finances of La Liga are going to do nothing to help rescue Atlético on the budget sheet, either.

Supporting this club is like being in an unhealthy relationship with a girlfriend/boyfriend. Your partner does nothing but bring you pain. What little excitement there is, is short-lived and overshadowed by the disappointments. And yet, you keep coming back, expecting things to finally be different.

A lot of people have said how Albert Einstein defined insanity as, “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” I am going to provide my own definition.

insanity
in-san-i-ty
noun
1. the condition of being insane; supporting Atlético Madrid

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