Atletico take on Ittihad in Saudi Arabia to round off winter break

Rest? What’s rest? Atletico Madrid are in Saudi Arabia where they will play the oldest team in the country, Ittihad, in a game that will surely make a few extra euros for when they can sign players again once their transfer ban has been lifted, or run its course.

The game takes place on Friday 30th of December at 18:45 CET and all of the big names are included apart from Diego Godin. Rubén Fernández and Juan Moreno from the B team are also named in the squad. As is Thomas Partey despite being named in Ghana’s squad to take part in the for the best part of a month in the African Cup of Nations that will take him out for most of January and some of February depending on how far his country make it. Tiago, Jan Oblak and Augusto Fernandez remain sidelined through injury.

Atletico’s upcoming fixtures include a Copa del Rey clash on Tuesday against Las Palmas, followed by another away game against Eibar just four days later. From Eibar to Las Palmas, it is over 2,000km and while they will most likely stop off in Madrid for a day or two, the amount of travelling the squad will have done in the last week might not bode well for a decent, and much needed, run of form in the coming weeks.

The only chance you have to watch Atletico Madrid is on Gol in Spain but we relay any news coming from Saudi Arabia, if and when it happens.

Squad List: Moyá, Moreira, Filipe, Savic, Vrsaljko, Lucas, Juanfran, Giménez, Koke, Saúl, Carrasco, Gabi, Thomas, Gaitán, Rubén Fdez., Juan Moreno, Griezmann, Fernando Torres, Correa and Gameiro