Four wins, three draws, and zero losses.
That is Atletico Madrid’s unbeaten record this year against their cross-town rivals Real Madrid in all competitions.
Usually trying to learn anything concrete from matches between only two teams over a year is a superfluous exercise. Playing two games a season against another team isn’t nearly a big enough sample size to draw any reasonable conclusions. Head-to-head records can come down to little things such as injuries, a lucky bounce, a manager testing out a new formation or any other small adjustment that becomes insignificant over the course of a campaign.
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However, in the case of the Madrid derby there seems to be a meaningful trend emerging, and we could see further evidence of that trend when these city rivals face each other for an eighth and final time in this week’s UEFA Champions League quarterfinal second leg at the Bernabeu.
In their seven previous encounters, Atletico has yet to lose and scored 12 goals, while Real has been held to four. Diego Simeone has never been one to shy away from the fact Atletico’s success has been based off defending and playing without the ball. Simeone has directly responded to critics of his style saying, “I value what this team has and it won’t change.”
So it is no surprise that Atletico’s dominance over Real has come on the back of holding a team that averages 2.97 goals per game in La Liga this season to only 0.57 goals per game in Madrid derbies. However, what is interesting is how this defensive solidity has manifested itself.
First, Atletico is happy to play without the ball. In fact they’ve only averaged 49 percent possession this season, which is surprisingly low for a team sitting third place in La Liga. Against Real they’ve been even more comfortable without the ball averaging only 36 percent possession.
Given that Atletico has done an excellent job keeping Real off the score sheet while allowing them to have so much of the ball it would make sense that they would have limited los blancos’ shot attempts, but this hasn’t been the case.
Real has averaged 18.2 shots per game in La Liga this season. In Madrid derbies they’ve averaged slightly fewer, with 16.4 shots per game. This is a bit of a drop off, but over 16 shots per game is still quite impressive and a two shot drop off certainly cannot explain Real scoring almost two and half goals fewer per game against Atletico.
Looking at only shots on target tells a little bit more of the story, where in the league Real average 7.5 shots on target per game, but against Atletico they’ve only managed 4.3 shots per game.
The more significant difference is what Real actually does with these shots on target. Real has scored with 40 percent of their shots on target during league play, but has only scored with 13 percent of their shots on target in Madrid derbies.
This on the surface is a bit of worrying sign for Atletico because conversion rates—the number of goals per shots on target—tend to even out over the course of a season. That is to say that if Real has only managed to score with 13 percent of their shots on target then they are probably just getting unlucky and we should expect this number to rise. In soccer the average team scores with about one in every three shots on target (33 percent), so Real’s 13 percent against Atletico looks due to increase.
However, a closer look at Real’s low conversion rate against Atletico suggests that there may be a tangible reason for this beyond just bad luck.
In the league this year Real has taken seven percent of their shots from inside the six-yard box, 55 percent from inside the 18-yard box and 38 percent from outside the box. These numbers are fairly standard, the difference being of course that Real takes way more shots than the average team.
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In the seven games against Atletico this season Real’s shooting positions have been comparatively much worse. In the derbies, Real have taken only three percent of their shots from inside the six-yard box, 48 percent from inside the 18-yard box and 49 percent from outside the box.
Real’s low conversion rate against Atletico suddenly makes sense given that they’ve taken almost half of their shots in these games from outside of the penalty area. Even with Cristiano Ronaldo, Gareth Bale and Karim Benzema at Real’s disposal, scoring consistently from outside the box is an incredibly tough task.
Simeone’s tactics in the derbies seem to follow the “bend don’t break” mantra. Atletico allows Real to have the ball, they even allow Real to shoot the ball, but in the box they draw the line and limit opportunities from prime shooting locations.
So far this strategy has worked to great effect and if Simeone can make it work just one more time Atletico Madrid will find themselves back in the Champions League semifinals for a second straight season.
Sam Gregory is soccer analytics writer based in Montreal. Follow him on Twitter