Memorable moments: Atlético broke the dominance of Real Madrid and Barcelona to win the title in 2014

It took exactly 10 years for a team other than Real Madrid or Barcelona to win La Liga. Since 2004, a new winner was waiting until 2014, when Atlético Madrid took over the Spanish top flight.

Memorable Moments is a special project by Ruik that commemorates the most iconic moments that have happened in football. Today, we look back at Atlético Madrid’s unexpected title.

The 2003/04 edition of La Liga was dominated by Valencia, for the second time in three years. But that was the end of the Bats. Since then, Real Madrid and Barcelona have regained control of Spain.

The Catalans won the following two seasons in 2004/05 and 2005/06, and Real Madrid also won twice in a row in 2006/07 and 2007/08.

But then Pep Guardiola stepped in and established Catalan dominance. Barcelona won in 2009, 2010 and 2011, after which the domination was halted by José Mourinho with Real Madrid. The next season, however, Barcelona took the title back.

Thus came the 2013/14 season and there was no reason to think that one of the Real Madrid-Barcelona pairing would not win the title again. Los Blancos had the trio of Ronaldo – Benzema – Bale at their disposal, while the duo Messi – Neymar were in control at Camp Nou.

But at the time, no one knew that Atlético Madrid would have the season of their lives with Diego Simeone on the bench. The first hint came in the Spanish Super Cup pre-season, when Atlético drew twice with Barcelona (1-1 and 0-0) and lost only because of the away goals rule.

However, the Colchoneros have started well in La Liga. Winning 3:1 against Sevilla, 5:0 against Rayo, 2:1 in Sociedad, 4:2 against Almeria, 2:0 against Valladolid, 2:1 against Osasuna. After six rounds, they went into the city derby with Real with full points and managed to rob the Santiago Bernabéu thanks to Diego Costa’s 79th minute goal.

After that, Atleti also beat Celta Vigo, with their first loss of points coming in the ninth round when they fell to Espanyol. After that, however, they have made up for it with a run of nine games without defeat, winning eight and drawing only once with Villarreal.

Second half of the season

The Colchoneros thus went into the new year with 16 wins and only one draw and defeat. In January came the first clash with Barcelona on home soil, which ended in a goalless draw. This was followed by another draw with Sevilla.

In February, it looked like Simeone’s selection was running out of breath. First they fell short against Almeria, then two weeks later they lost 0:3 to Osasuna. Then came the Madrid derby, where Ronaldo equalised at 2:2 only in the 82nd minute.

However, the Rojiblancos bounced back from that to record nine wins in a row. This clearly demonstrated that they are going for the title at any cost. However, the last step is always the hardest and with three rounds to go, a setback came in the form of a loss to Levante, followed only by a draw with Malaga.

In the last game, however, Atlético only needed a draw to win the title. But on probably the worst possible ground, the stadium of Barcelona. In the 33rd minute, Piqué opened the scoring and panic set in. But in the 49th minute, Diego Godín equalised and Atleti defended the draw to secure their tenth league title in their history.

Source: La Liga