Atletico Madrid Concedes 8 Goals in 5 Games, Worst Defensive Start of Simeone's 15-Year Reign

Eight goals in five games. Say it fast and it doesn't sound like much, but for a team that built its identity for more than a decade on the idea that "they don't score against us," it's a number that sets off alarms. Atletico Madrid arrived at Anfield with a defense already under strain and left with fresh wounds: a 2-1 loss to Liverpool, the club's second straight defeat.

Diego Simeone didn't hide from the problem. If anything, he laid it out in detail, game by game. "There were two this Wednesday, three in Bilbao, one in Seville, two against Villarreal," the coach said, running through the trail of goals conceded in the early going of LaLiga and the Champions League. Then he got straight to the point: "We're clearly conceding too many goals."

The numbers don't lie: 1.6 goals allowed per game through these first five matches is, quite simply, the worst defensive start of Simeone's fifteen seasons in charge of the club. It's not even close to last season, 2025-26, when seven goals conceded over the same stretch had already raised some yellow flags. To find anything comparable, you have to look at the full-season average from 2024-25, when the team reached the Copa del Rey final and the Champions League semifinals despite allowing 85 goals in 61 games (a 1.39 average), which had stood until now as the high water mark of the Argentine coach's tenure.

The rest of the numbers back it up: from 0.54 goals per game in 2015-16 to 1.29 in 2023-24, no previous season had come close to the current 1.6 mark. And that's despite the fact that Simeone's Atletico is no longer the low-block, long-ball team of his early years. These days the side builds from the back, pass by pass, an approach that's been in place for several seasons now and one that leaves the center backs more exposed whenever something breaks down in possession.

Pieces That Won't Quite Fit

Simeone has been shuffling his defense from game to game, searching for the right formula. He opened the league campaign with Carlos Martin, Jorge Dominguez, Robin Le Normand, David Hancko and Dani Martinez in a 2-0 win over Malaga. Then came variations involving Giuliano Simeone, Marc Pubill, Alejandro Grimaldo and Marcos Llorente, through a draw against Villarreal, a win in Seville and a rough 3-0 defeat at San Mames against Athletic Club.

At Anfield came a significant new wrinkle: Cristian "Cuti" Romero made his debut in the back line alongside Pubill, Hancko and Giuliano Simeone, and everything points to his starting spot being here to stay. The Argentine center back wasn't sharp on Liverpool's first goal, but he held his position well after that. His coach's assessment: "I liked his game, solid, strong, with real presence, and he showed he can handle one-on-one situations."

After the match in Liverpool, Simeone didn't mince words in his self-criticism: "At times it went well, at times it went badly. They won the ball back on the play that led to the 1-1, and we could have handled that better. This is something we can learn and grow from. We need to work. There's no other way. The team needs to sharpen up some important details. We're conceding too many goals, so we have to fix things defensively, because it's clear we're not defending the way we need to defend."

The schedule offers no rest, and the season has barely begun. It remains to be seen whether these adjustments come in time before the number keeps climbing.