In the early hours of the morning of 7 October 2024, the ninth round of La Liga saw a marquee match between Atletico Madrid and Real Sociedad. Atlético Madrid drew with Real Madrid in the last derby, while Real Sociedad beat Valencia at home. Griezmann assisted Alvarez's goal at the start of the match. After the goal, Atletico Madrid lost their desire to attack, and Real Sociedad kept attacking and eventually equalised with a goal from Sučić, ending the match in a draw.

It makes sense that Real scored just a minute after an exhausted Griezmann left the field. He was all over the place at times. He would set up a counterattack in one area and then sweep the ball in the other, attacking and defending until Simeone gave him a breather. In hindsight, this seems like a fatal mistake for Atlético. It doesn't seem like the Frenchman could have done anything to change the outcome of the match. De Paul made a bad mistake, and Sucic made an amazing save, but the fact is that he wasn't there to intervene. As I said, it makes sense.

The Argentine's 'boutade', who definitely plays when he feels like it, undermined the solidarity exercise by his teammates, to the excessive punishment of a Real that is not doing well, and even less so at home. However, they did not deserve as much punishment as they had been suffering from since the start. Kubo still had the second goal in a pretty rough final stretch for the visiting team. Some players seemed more interested in making gestures than in returning to their position when the ball went astray again. I think De Paul should come back, and not without reason.

Long before all that, the team that was expected to score had got one before the clock had even reached a minute. The goal was made good by Julián's left-footed shot, but also by Javi Galán's long pass and, above all, by Grizi's double delight in controlling and assisting with his backheel. The Argentine kept up the pressure after that, but couldn't find the goal. Atlético were happy to sit back and defend, and they did a good job of it, despite the individual error that led to the goal.

Real Madrid struggled to get into the game and for a while in the first half they couldn't get past Simeone's 5-4-1. The ball movement was decent, but it wasn't enough to break through the lines. So, Oblak's first actions, which were more impressive, came from set pieces or from distance. First, a corner led to a double save by Oblak after shots by Zubimendi and Aguerd. Second, the Moroccan was the only local defender who hadn't tried his luck from distance with just over 20 minutes played. It was a significant moment, but not particularly dangerous.

Atlético was struggling to keep up, and when they were already playing catch-up, they had to face Kubo, who never had a few moves to throw off the defence before finally looking for the goal. Lenglet and Galán were involved in that area, with Gallagher and Griezmann helping them, but the Japanese player was managing without that, and it didn't alter the situation before the break. Things had been marked from that distant first minute. The French centre back, incidentally, doesn't see the ball as the enemy. That's a big step forward if he can get to a point where he's physically ready to compete. Firstly, it's 90 minutes.

Imanol didn't want to wait and brought Brais on for the second half, taking Javi López off and changing Sergio Gómez's position. It was clear from the start that Real Sociedad were going to be a tough team to play against, with lots of fouls close to the area. The minutes went by and Atlético finally found a way to counterattack, with Nahuel just about to be rewarded for his efforts. Like Oyarzabal shortly after, he came up against Galán when he was about to hit it from close range. There were some changes, but only half of those that could be made (in fact, Oskarsson was going to come on, but the draw changed the plans), and things went downhill until De Paul and Sucic got things organised. So it was a draw, and as far as the standings are concerned, everyone is still unhappy.