Real Sociedadvs
Atlético MadridFor 83 minutes, Real Sociedad did everything right and scored nothing. Atlético Madrid did just enough to stay alive, and then — in the time it takes to blink — the game was over.
That's the brutal math of what happened at Anoeta on Sunday. La Real had the ball more (53.6% possession), worked nine corners, and kept Atlético pinned back for long stretches. The visitors had the sharper shots, though — 13 to Real Sociedad's 8, five on target to three — and when the moment came, they were ruthless.
Our pre-match read made Atlético Madrid the favorite at 45%, and the way it played out left no argument with that call.
The Last Six Minutes
The match was goalless heading into the 84th minute, which felt fair given how little either side had truly threatened. Then came the penalty. Alejandro Grimaldo stepped up and converted, and suddenly Real Sociedad — who had looked comfortable if toothless for most of the night — were chasing the game.
They never got the chance to chase it properly. Six minutes later, Jonathan David made it 2-0, finishing from a Grimaldo assist. The same man who scored the penalty was now threading passes through a Real Sociedad defense that had completely unraveled. And in the fifth minute of stoppage time, Giuliano Simeone added a third, set up by Dávid Hancko, to put a scoreline on the board that looked nothing like the match that preceded it.
Three goals in six minutes. Cabal, that's not a result you see coming when a team has spent 80-plus minutes going nowhere.
The bookings were a footnote by comparison — Yangel Herrera picked up a yellow for Real Sociedad in the 18th minute, Mikel Oyarzabal followed in the 78th, and Johnny Cardoso was cautioned for Atlético in the 75th — but none of them shaped what happened at the end.
What It Means
Real Sociedad will feel genuinely robbed by this one, and not without reason. Their pass accuracy was 90%, they created the corners, they kept the ball. The problem was converting any of it into danger — three shots on target in a home game is not good enough, regardless of how pretty the possession numbers look.
Atlético, meanwhile, arrive at this result off a form run that read WLLWD, so this was a badly needed three points. They were patient, they were compact, and when Real Sociedad's concentration slipped in the closing stages, Atlético punished them without mercy. El frío de Simeone's side — that cold-blooded late quality — has been their calling card for years, and Sunday was another reminder of it.
The question now is whether Real Sociedad can shake this off quickly. Losing a game you largely controlled, to a late collapse of this kind, lingers. For Atlético, the more interesting question is whether this is the start of something or just a one-night turnaround.
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