Amadaou Haidara and Willi Orban had done the smart thing really. Deep in the 90th minute, with the scores level between Atletico Madrid and their visiting RB Leipzig side, this had seemed the smart thing to do. Having hastily cleared an Atleti set piece, the two Leipzig players hurried to close down Antoine Griezmann as he dribbled out of the box with the ball.
Aware of the threat of the Atleti man's left foot, Haidara and Orban were trying to shut down that angle of attack when Griezmann suddenly dropped a shoulder, snapped into a turn and without pause curled a delicious ball right onto head of Jose Gimenez at the far post... with his right foot. On his supposed weak foot, Griezmann had found power, accuracy, and downright deliciousness, and made it all look the easiest thing ever. 1-1 became 2-1 and Leipzig's one point became zero.
The worst part? It wasn't really their fault -- as Haidara and Orban found out the hard way, when Antoine Griezmann is on song, there's not much anyone can do about it.
Playing in a free-roaming midfield role on Thursday night, Griezmann ran this Atleti-Leipzig game. He was everywhere: tackling deep, covering passing channels, moving things forward, swinging in crosses and even getting on the end of them. The latter showed up best when he scored the home side's equaliser with a delicious volley -- again with his right -- that he hit with just the correct amount of bounce and power to carry it over the diving Peter Gulacsi and under the crossbar. There were headers that forced stunning saves and near-assists. There were driving runs and cutting passes. Watching it in real-time it felt inevitable that Atleti would score a winner, and that Griezmann would have a hand in it somehow. There has been a big shakeup in the Atletico squad this season, but Griezmann remains the beating heart of the team.
After the match, an elated Diego Simeone would say, "When he plays well, different things happen." It's the kind of thing you say about generational footballers, and that's exactly what Griezmann is. 33 now, he's long been under the shadow of Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo but it's an oddity that most fans don't put him in the bracket below those two phenomena. A part of it is because of that failed move to Barcelona, but another is that he's the archetypal footballer's footballer. Strong off both feet (just ask Leipzig), good in the air, and comfortable anywhere on the pitch, his versatility and defensive discipline often mean he's not the flashiest player on the pitch. But like Simeone said, when he's feeling it, he's among the most effective.
"When I'm happy, it shows in training and on the pitch," Griezmann would say post-match. From the evidence of Thursday, he's certainly one happy man right now. For reminding the big stage of how good a player he is, Antoine Griezmann takes our first UCL Moment of the Week for this season.