Atletico Madrid - Real Madrid: the Metropolitano celebrates its fifth birthday party

The Civitas Metropolitano is the venue for another derby between Atletico Madrid and Real Madrid this Sunday (9 pm), an absolute classic in the LaLiga calendar.

Both clubs have been facing off regularly for just over a century with a few notable periods of exception. Namely, during the Spanish Civil War - they didn't play from February 1936 until October 1939 - and two seasons in which Atleti played in the second division (2000/01 and 2001/02).

Of course, different stadiums, like the Santiago Bernabeu (currently being renovated) or the Vicente Calderon (destroyed in 2019) have hosted the derby, the most important football game in the Spanish capital.

But it's the Metropolitano's privilege to host the derby this week. And what a time to do so as this week marks five years since the inauguration of the 'new' Metropolitano.

Atletico's home from 1923 to 1966 bore the same name, but without a sponsor attached, of course. The club wanted to reconnect to the “Metropolitano” and return to its roots and thus set out to build a new Metropolitano, re-opening it on September 16th, 2017.

Five years later, Atletico Madrid are set to compete in their new cauldron against the champions of Europe and Spain with up to 68,000 people in attendance.

Antoine Griezmann (31), the scorer of the first goal in the Civitas Metropolitano (against Malaga in September 2017), will be hoping to find the net again. Although he probably won’t be in the starting lineup due to his well-documented contractual conundrum.

Real Madrid, who have won the derby 51% of the time (in official matches), have not yet dropped a point this season. However, they have only won once in five visits to their cross-town rival's new stadium. Real's last triumph there was in February 2019 (1-3).

Carlo Ancelotti and his players may have many reasons to feel confident going into this weekend's match but the statistics say, at the very least, it will still be a tough task. The derby always is. 

In their last meeting last season in May, Atleti won 1-0 courtesy of a Yannick Carrasco (29) penalty kick. That was a largely inconsequential derby though, because there was little at stake.

The Merengues had won LaLiga a few days earlier in the Santiago Bernabeu against Espanyol. Furthermore, Real had just beaten Manchester City and were already thinking about their Champions League final against Liverpool.

With this season still in its embryonic stages, a lot more is at stake this time around.

The question is, can Simeone's men give the home faithful something to celebrate on the New Metropolitano's fifth birthday?