Atletico Madrid host Tottenham Hotspur in the first leg of their Round of 16 tie in 2025-26 UEFA Champions League.
Atletico Madrid overcame Club Brugge in their Knockout Play-Off tie, whilst Tottenham finished fourth in the League Phase to secure their spot in this stage.
Team News
Rodrigo Mendoza is a doubt for Atletico Madrid after he suffered an ankle injury during their 3-2 La Liga win against Real Sociedad.
Pablo Barrios (hamstring) is a doubt for selection.
Tottenham will have Mickey van de Ven available despite his red card in their 3-1 Premier League defeat at home to Crystal Palace, because his ban doesn’t apply to this competition.
Djed Spence (calf) and Radu Dragusin (knock) face late fitness checks, but Cristian Romero is back from his suspension.
Destiny Udogie, Rodrigo Bentancur (both hamstring), Lucas Bergvall, Ben Davies (both ankle), Mohammed Kudus (quad), James Maddison, Wilson Odobert (both ACL) and Dejan Kulusevski (knee) are still ruled out.
When is Kick-Off?
Atletico host Tottenham at Metropolitano Stadium on Tuesday 10 March at 9pm CET (8pm UK Time), live on TNT Sports 1 in the UK.
Stat Attack
- This is Atletico Madrid’s first Champions League meeting against Tottenham.
- Tottenham lost their only previous visit to Atletico’s Metropolitano Stadium in June 2019, albeit in a 2-0 defeat to Liverpool in the 2018-19 Final.
- Atletico are yet to keep a clean sheet at home in this season’s Champions League (W4, L1).
- Randal Kolo Muani has scored three goals in Tottenham’s last two away matches in the Champions League (W1, L1).
Prediction
Unbeaten in their last five matches across all competitions despite keeping one clean sheet and assured of a top-four domestic finish, Atletico can afford to now put more weight behind this European campaign as this is a chance to collect some silverware for the first time in five years.
Tottenham meanwhile can’t afford to repeat last season’s antics of putting their eggs in the European basket because they are in a serious domestic relegation scrap, but this cup run could be helpful from a momentum sense if they can translate their form of this competition to have a run across their two competitions.
Spurs however just lack confidence at present which was evident in how easily they imploded when took the lead against Palace, so the return of Romero is nicely timed to partner Van de Ven which should instil more confidence in the defensive spine of the team.
As typical as it would be of Spurs this season to do well in this competition amidst their domestic woes, I do think that their issues will catch up with them soon, and it might well be now given Atletico’s form.
Prediction: Atletico Madrid 3-1 Tottenham
Result: Atletico Madrid 5-2 Tottenham
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