Real Madrid go through and Levante go home, 0‑2 the scoreline that did it. The dressing room will call the league the priority now, because that is what dressing rooms say.
Carlos Álvarez was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad15 Feb 2027
Words at Levante training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Thomas Lemar is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
At 23 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
17 points and a position everybody in the ground can do the arithmetic on. The songs have stopped being about the team and started being about surviving, which is a different noise entirely.
Everything was agreed until it was not, and Carlos Espí reports back to Levante with a summer to forget. Neither club is saying who walked away from the table.
The offer was not close and it was refused without much discussion. Whether the second one is refused as quickly is another matter.
Squad8 Feb 2027
Thomas Lemar falls out with a teammate over standards
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Levante this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
3‑0, and the margin flattered nobody — it could have carried another goal or two without complaint. Afternoons like this are why people keep coming.
Player ratings14 Sep 2026
A brace, and Thomas Lemar takes the afternoon — 8.98
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Thomas Lemar provided it, and the 8.98 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Julián Álvarez is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 20 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Atlético Madrid this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Nobody at Atlético Madrid will say this on the record and the team sheets have been saying it for weeks. There is a small group in every squad who get picked when the fixture is difficult, and he has joined it.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Atlético Madrid can pretend not to have heard.
Alejandro Grimaldo was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
8.36. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
There is a version of this player everybody suspected was in there, and on this evidence it is. 8.39, and no argument anywhere in the ground.
Squad24 Aug 2026
The manager has not finished forgetting Jan Oblak's mistake
Publicly it is behind everybody. It is not behind the man who picks the team, and the only place that shows is a team sheet. He will get another chance; he will get it in a match that matters less.
“I want to win things, and I would like to do it here.” Nothing has been demanded and nothing has been threatened — but a boardroom at Atlético Madrid hears a sentence like that exactly as it was built.
Alejandro Grimaldo was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Add another name to the list: Granada have asked the question everybody in the game has been asking about Carlos Martín. The answer from Atlético Madrid has not changed — yet.