Diego Simeone sent some veiled criticism in the direction of Pep Guardiola after Atletico Madrid's Champions League exit to Manchester City, suggesting the Blues boss 'praised Atleti with contempt.'
After an intense first leg that saw Atletico defend resiliently and concede just once at the Etihad, Guardiola had mentioned how difficult it's been to break down such a set up 'since prehistory'. Those comments were taken out of context by Atletico and Spanish media, who took it as a criticism, so tensions were already high going into the second leg.
City's 0-0 draw at the Wanda Metropolitano was marred by a large melee towards the end, and an incident in the tunnel after the game involving both sets of players. Simeone was booked for entering the pitch to try and calm his players, but he didn't entirely diffuse the situation with Guardiola when asked if the City boss had 'disrespected' Atletico with his comments over their style of play.
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"I don’t have to have that sort of opinion. I don’t think he will talk badly or talk well," Simeone said of Guardiola, before accusing his counterpart of damning with faint praise.
"Often, people who talk really well, and are really clever, they manage to praise you with contempt. But those of us who perhaps have a smaller vocabulary are not so stupid either."
Simeone also clarified that he was not applauding City or their fans after the game, when Atletico's support all rose as one to get behind their side even before the final whistle had gone.
"I never applauded the rival bench or our rivals," he insisted. "I was applauding our fans in one side of the stadium and the other side of the stadium. I was applauding everyone who was behind us for the whole of the 90 minutes and I wanted to give them my thanks.
"Our players were giving the people that energy and the people were giving it back, but of course we couldn’t give them what we all wanted which was going through."
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