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An hour earlier, anyone suggesting Barcelona would lose would have been laughed out of the room.
Their opponents were Celta Vigo, sixteenth in the table. The bookmakers had Celta at 4.7 to win—Barcelona were expected to collect three points without breaking a sweat.
Historical records favoured Barcelona heavily. But buried within those statistics was a curious detail: Barcelona hadn't won any of their last four visits to Balaídos.
Most people overlooked it.
Six minutes in, Barcelona suffered a blow. Dembélé limped off injured. A shadow fell over the travelling supporters.
But as the match progressed, their anxiety eased. Barcelona dominated possession, created chances, controlled the tempo. Alex, Dembélé's replacement, performed admirably.
Then the sixty-seventh minute arrived.
Celta delivered a seemingly harmless cross from the right wing. Vidal misjudged his positioning. Maxi Gómez swept the ball into the net.
Celta Vigo 1-0 Barcelona.
The travelling supporters fell silent. Stunned. Barcelona had been utterly dominant—how had the weaker side taken the lead?
On the touchline, Valverde hurled his water bottle to the ground. The referee issued a warning.
Barcelona pushed forward desperately. Celta retreated into a defensive shell. Attack after attack looked promising—but the final ball never quite arrived.
Eighty-eighth minute.
Another Celta cross from the flank. This time, it struck the raised arm of substitute right-back Moussa Wagué. VAR confirmed the handball was inside the area.
Penalty.
Converted.
Celta Vigo 2-0 Barcelona.
Game over.
Just twenty-four hours earlier, Barcelona fans had been mocking Atlético's collapse against Espanyol. Now the tables had turned spectacularly.
At the Atlético training ground, the squad had gathered anxiously around screens during Barcelona's match. The moment Celta's first goal went in, the facility erupted in cheers.
A sixteenth-placed team had become their saviours.
The gap remained four points.
Simeone's suspension ended. Atlético immediately entered a closed training camp. The manager banned all player interviews.
The fans prayed nothing similar would happen in the final two rounds.
Barcelona's supporters, meanwhile, had run out of tears.
The Champions League second leg arrived. Holding a three-goal cushion from the Camp Nou, Barcelona travelled to Anfield.
Facing a desperate Liverpool side with nothing to lose, Barcelona produced the worst performance of their season in the most important match of their season.
Liverpool 4-0 Barcelona.
Aggregate: 4-3 to Liverpool.
The scoreboard mocked Valverde's pre-first-leg declaration. It mocked every Barcelona supporter who'd already started planning their trip to Madrid for the final.
In the Anfield stands, Barcelona fans remained long after the whistle. They couldn't process what had happened. A three-goal lead, overturned. The treble dream, shattered.
One moment they'd been dreaming of history. Now only the Copa del Rey remained.
Many buried their faces in their hands and wept.
The following day, as Atlético trained, Simeone gathered the squad.
"Football is round. Sometimes it's deeply unfair—a few minutes can destroy months of hard work. But at the same time, it's completely fair. When you're not serious enough, not committed enough, not respectful enough of the game... it will make you pay."
The words landed like cold water.
Every Atlético player understood the message.
Criticism of Barcelona—and Valverde specifically—dominated the Spanish press. The same journalists who'd praised them before Anfield now tore them apart.
The club moved to protect their manager. General manager Alemany affirmed Valverde's coaching ability and stated there was no intention to make a change.
Then, perhaps to divert attention from the European humiliation, Alemany raised another topic entirely.
Griezmann.
He announced that Barcelona had officially submitted a hundred-million-euro bid to Atlético Madrid. He spoke of the player's "determination" to join.
The tactic worked. Overnight, the Champions League exit vanished from the headlines. Every outlet focused on the transfer saga instead.
Atlético supporters were furious. To keep Griezmann, the club paid him the highest salary in the squad—twenty-three million euros after tax. The Frenchman had publicly stated he wouldn't leave Madrid.
Now Barcelona were trying to unsettle him at the worst possible moment.
The Griezmann transfer became the most-watched story in Spanish football.
But Atlético had bigger concerns.
Two matches remained.
The title was still theirs to lose.
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