‘Atleti have lost their fire’

Atletico Madrid have lost the fire in their belly and need to make better use of their summer signings, says Terry Gibson.

Diego Simeone’s side were beaten by their local rivals Real in Saturday’s Madrid derby – the final meeting at the Vicente Calderon Stadium – with a Cristiano Ronaldo hat-trick seeing them fall to a second successive league defeat. 

Sky Sports’ Spanish football expert Gibson believes Atletico have lost the motivation that propelled them to the La Liga title in the 2013/14 season and was critical of substitutions made by the manager. 

“The fire in their belly has gone a bit, it really has,” Gibson said on the La Liga Weekly podcast. 

“First of all, I was really surprised to see Fernando Torres. That experiment has to stop. When you spend €32m on Kevin Gameiro who’s been in pretty good form, he should be starting.

“I think the reason Torres played on Saturday was to give them a bit more power up front and Simeone believes that Torres still has the same big-game performances in him. He got the nod to be a six-foot centre forward who puts himself about, but it didn’t work.

“I then thought it was a mistake when they were at their best to make two changes in the middle of that. I didn’t think there was an awful lot between the two teams in the first – Real Madrid maybe …

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