A dynamic Atlético, with a lot of mobility in its attacking men, realized that Osasuna was hooked on Jonathan David's scoring instinct to open the match. Kang-in Lee, Le Normand with a good right hand and Baena, who closed the scoring to sign a performance from the expected player, were the executors of the Navarrese team. That the Korean and the Almerian enjoyed it was good news. The two played 90 minutes.
There were four goals, and Atlético did not register more because Aitor Fernández accumulated four or five prodigious hands that avoided a major beating. In Osasuna's defense is the goal disallowed with the score at 1-0, according to the referee because Torró hit Le Normand's head with his head in a passed cross that Arguibide ended up scoring. To say the least, a debatable decision much protested by the Osasuna players.
Four days before the next derby at the Metropolitano, with Hancko, Giuliano and Pubill reserved, Simeone's team was dominant and difficult to decipher for the five-man defense set up by Luis Miguel Ramis. The Osasunista coach also took a look at the calendar and the physical loads and left his scorer Budimir on the bench.
Grimaldo represented the defensive confusion of the Navarrese team better than anyone. It is quite a novelty that a winger or a full-back plays so frequently as an interior player. And not only because of his natural wing, the left. Grimaldo appeared in the central aisle and also on the right. Throughout his career, his value as a winger has always been greater as an offensive player than as a defensive player. Anything that involves attacking suits him and this Wednesday he was seen enjoying that freedom so unusual in Simeone's script to get away from his band.
A header from Lookman, a shot from Kang-in Lee repelled by Aitor Fernández and another from Grimaldo that hit the chest of an Osasuna defender was the first cascade of chances that Atlético generated, which played with Koke and Cardoso in the center of operations. Both got the red and white machinery going when they sharpened their passes and gave fluidity to the game. Osasuna responded to that first red-and-white volley with a counterattack that neither Cuti Romero managed to intercept when Raúl Moro led it, nor Le Normand when the rival attacker filtered the pass behind him. It arrived with the striker Raúl García. Oblak blocked the shot because he had read the play well and when the Osasunista striker finished he already had the Slovenian goalkeeper on top of him. That was Osasuna's best play in the entire game, apart from the goal that had been disallowed.
Atlético also had a good version of Kang-in Lee and Baena, free to act as a false nine or playmaker. But no one took better advantage of playing without ties in attack than Grimaldo. He broke through the right flank of the area to collect a good lob from Cardoso from the front. Jonathan David finished off his center back first, but he met Aitor Fernández's reflexes to swipe the shot. The ball fell again to the Canadian who did not forgive again. Two goals in two games to reaffirm their status as goal hunters. David exudes an air of a sibylline striker, with a limited but effective repertoire. He downloads the game well, attacks space and with the ball sometimes looks like a futsal pivot. With a step on a tile he put his marker at the top of the area and Kang-in Lee wasted his assist. When a tight and hard shot from the Korean was rejected, he went to try to finish off Aitor Fernández, who with another miraculous save established himself as Osasuna's best player. His performance further opens the debate in the goal that Sergio Herrera, another good goalkeeper, had occupied until this afternoon.
Aitor Fernández was once again the protagonist in the restart when Baena put him to the test. He was already able to do little or almost nothing in Kang-in Lee's goals, well assisted with a subtle touch by Jonathan David, in Le Normand's and Baena's.
