Atletico’s pre-season friendlies announced

It just seems like yesterday that Cristiano Ronaldo was stepping up to take a penalty that would beat Jan Oblak and plunge a dagger into the hearts of Atletico Madrid fans the world over. The despair, the doom, the drama. It still cuts to the core of all of us.

And so, a new year is upon us and with that a fresh sense of optimism and while we will never forget that dastardly Ronaldo and his cronies as they waltzed around the San Siro, we will learn from it and move on.

The pre-season friendly schedule is out and here they are.

Atletico meet on the 7th of July at Majadahonda for their first training session.

On July 10th, the squad will move to Los Angeles de San Rafael where Simeone and Profe Ortega will put the players through their paces to be fit and ready for the upcoming season.

The same stage of the season that Luciano Vietto struggled during and Simeone laughed at him.

On Saturday the 23rd, they will play Numancia in El Burgo de Osma, north of Madrid.

They will then return to Madrid and continue to train before flying out to Australia where they will play two games. They will play Tottenham Hotspur on July 29th at 11am GMT in the International Champions Cup at the Melbourne Cricket Ground and then on July 31st, Los Rojiblancos play Melbourne Victory in Simonds Stadium at 5.00am GMT.

Following a return to Madrid, Atletico will then play Galatasaray on August 8th at 7.30pm GMT.

South it is then as the squad travel to Cadiz where they will play Cadiz on August 12th at 5.30pm GMT with another game being played the day after that has not been specified yet.

After that, it is back to Madrid to finish off preparations for the 2016-17 season, which is hopefully a good one.