The Bavarians dominate in Bergamo, the worst defeat in European history for a team incapable of replicating the exploits of the past.
Italy says goodbye to the Champions League with a terrible impression. It’s true, there is still the return to the Allianz in eight days, but the football lesson given by Bayern Munich at the home of a modest and frightened Atalanta as rarely in recent times leaves no room for the imagination. It was a defeat resulting from a total blackout from the first to the last minute. Evoking the greater firepower of the Bavarians is of little use; even the Borussia Dortmund comeback in Bergamo or the Chelsea beaten in the first phase were of another level and yet Atalanta had been able to hold the field.
This time there was no story. At no stage of the match did the Bergamo players seem able to contain the fury of Bayern Munich, a true shooting gallery with many culprits and no one who could save themselves. A bad blow for a team that had become accustomed to frequenting the elite circles of European football, often going beyond its limits. The Atalanta of the extraordinary ride to Dublin in the Europa League, that of the Champions League semi-final which faded in the last assault against PSG and of the two triumphs at Anfield away to Liverpool: nothing.
The worst defeat in history in Europe on the most awaited evening of a season full of contradictions, in which the whole of Atalanta was affected by the end of the Gasperini era, accumulating a fair amount of errors and omissions, from the choice of Gasp’s heir to the construction of a squad evidently not up to the challenge. Every now and then even the best people make mistakes and it happened to the Percassi club this year.
Let’s be clear, going out at the hands of a battleship designed to raise the most important cup to the sky is not a surprise and not even a fault. Doing it this way, however, casts a shadow over everything. Nobody asked Atalanta to put Bayern Munich out but despite being very strong, the Bavarians are the same team eliminated a year ago by Inter in another situation. In short, we could have done better. Going out like this hurts.
