Atalanta couldn't quite beat Real Madrid – but showed why the Serie ...

Gian Piero Gasperini wasn’t falling for it. He’d heard it on the radio and seen it in the newspapers. His team, Atalanta, were apparently favourites against Real Madrid in the Champions League. Atalanta! Gasperini gave a wry smile. “No team can feel favourites against Real Madrid,” he protested.

The very suggestion came as a reminder of just how much the club’s fortunes have changed in Gasperini’s eight years in Bergamo.

Eight years have eclipsed the 109 that went before at Atalanta, so much so that families taking their kids to the Gewiss on Champions League nights have a hard time making the next generation of fans believe this team once defined success by gaining promotion to Serie A and bouncing back after relegation. Challenging for the Scudetto in Serie A, reaching multiple Coppa Italia finals and lifting the Europa League in Dublin was beyond their wildest dreams.

That success against a hitherto undefeated Bayer Leverkusen side was rewarded with a place in the Super Cup against Madrid, the Champions League winners, in Warsaw last August. “As a moment, it seemed like the highest point in the history of the club,” Gasperini reflected.

At the time, he lamented not being able to call upon the team that delivered Atalanta a first major trophy in more than six decades. Teun Koopmeiners was holding out for a move to Juventus, which he’d only get at the end of the transfer window. Ademola Lookman, the hat-trick hero from Dublin, felt it was time to leave amid interest from PSG. His head had been turned.

Another three-letter acronym tormented Gasperini: ACL. Giorgio Scalvini and last season’s top scorer, Gianluca Scamacca, were unavailable after blowing out their knee ligaments. The bench was full of graduates from Atalanta’s esteemed academy. Marco Palestra and Alberto Manzoni, for instance, were Gasperini’s final substitutions in a 2-0 defeat that wasn’t decided until Kylian Mbappe’s debut goal for Madrid in the middle of the second half.

If the Super Cup was the zenith, as Gasperini defined it, then was the only way down for Atalanta afterwards? They were cash-rich after winning the Europa League and qualifying for the bumper Champions League. More minority partners bought into the club, too. Koopmeiners’ eventual sale, a windfall only surpassed by Rasmus Hojlund’s transfer to Manchester United the previous summer, was not obligatory. The balance sheet was buoyant. Atalanta had never had it so good. It was simultaneously the best time to be at the club and also arguably the time to leave. The chance to go out on a high.

Not for the first time, Napoli owner Aurelio De Laurentiis made overtures to Gasperini.

“I thought about it,” he confided to Corriere dello Sport. “There have been times when I believed the moment had come to bid Atalanta farewell. I wanted to do it without controversy and, more than anything, without disappointment. In the end, we won and Bergamo prevailed. (Antonio) Conte’s now in Naples and I don’t think the fans can be upset about that.”

And yet, who stepped out in front of them at the top of Serie A at the weekend? Atalanta have never been top at this stage of the season before. “Vin-ce-RE-mooo! Vin-ce-RE-moooo! Vin-ce-RE-mooo il tricolor!” the fans sang at the Gewiss after a 2-1 win over AC Milan last Friday night. “We’re gonna win the title”.

It wasn’t the first time Gasperini has faced questions of  “is this your year?”. Can you do it? He has brushed them off in the past, even when Papu Gomez, Duvan Zapata and Josip Ilicic were helping the team combine for more than 100 goals a season in all competitions.

Gasperini felt they constituted wishful thinking. The dizzy heights he’d led Atalanta to climb had, in turn, caused a loss of perspective. Winning the league wasn’t in Atalanta’s tradition unless it was Serie B. The wealth gap would inevitably tell over a 38-game season. But on Friday, Gasperini turned to the fans and said: “Let them sing.” It was Atalanta’s record-equalling ninth successive win in the league.

During that time, in addition to Milan at home, they have beaten Napoli and Roma away. Outside the big games, Atalanta have put four past Lecce, five past Gasperini’s old club, Genoa, and six past Hellas Verona and Young Boys. They are Serie A’s top scorers and Scamacca’s replacement, Mateo Retegui, has made an early run at becoming this season’s top scorer, the Capocannoniere.

No wonder people were tipping them against Madrid then. The moment in and of itself isn’t enough alone to explain “the electricity” Gasperini discerned in the atmosphere around Tuesday’s game. Atalanta have established themselves in Europe now. They have kept coming back for more over the past seven years. Every experience has made them better, stronger, more at ease on this stage. As was the case when Inter returned from the Champions League final in 2023, empowered by the belief they could have defeated Man City, Atalanta came back from beating Leverkusen with an aura, a new gear which, in turn, has made Serie A a lot easier to them.

In the Curva Pisani on Tuesday night, a scenografia rippled up the stands. It depicted Gasperini as a knight on a white charger. The accompanying caption read: “Atalanta’s proud condottiero, you brought Bergamo lustre and glory, Gian Piero Gasperini forever in our history.” As much as Mbappe seems to love playing against Atalanta, he succumbed to injury shortly after Marco Carnesecchi stopped him making it 2-0 to Real Madrid and, from then onwards, the home side grew into the game.

Antonio Rudiger twice had to slide in front of Mario Pasalic to stop Lookman from setting up early chances for an equaliser. Charles De Ketelaere then levelled the score from the spot after a classic Gasperini move. De Ketelaere’s penalty stemmed from Atalanta’s centre-back Saed Kolasinac following an attack and darting into the box.

Nevertheless, Madrid es Madrid and they looked like a team fighting to qualify against a hitherto unbeaten top-eight Champions League side. The Vinicius Junior and Jude Bellingham one-two punch for the goals that sent Madrid 2-1 and then 3-1 up might have finished off other teams, but Atalanta, to use Bergamasco dialect, Mola Mia (they never give up).

Ederson continued to swarm and the team’s bench, deeper than ever before, allowed Atalanta to keep their foot down. On came summer signings Lazar Samardzic, Odilon Kossounou, Retegui and Nico Zaniolo. Perhaps only Simone Inzaghi at Inter can turn to his dugout and count on more quality.

Lookman made it 3-2 with his 11th goal of the season and, in stoppage time of extra time, thought he’d set up a dramatic and deserved leveller only for Retegui to miss from point-blank range.

It was a reminder of a couple of things. First and foremost, the development of Lookman, who finished 14th in the Ballon d’Or vote and remains the favourite to succeed his compatriot Victor Osimhen as the African Player of the Year award later this month. Next, how is it possible, given his form, that Retegui, the Capocannoniere in Serie A, missed a penalty in the 0-0 against Arsenal and then this chance against Madrid? Had both gone in, only Liverpool would be ahead of Atalanta in the Champions League table.

“We can win these games,” Gasperini said. “That’s the motivation that drives us on.” It is also the level of consciousness that can bring a fairytale Scudetto. Atalanta are, more and more, beginning to resemble Sampdoria in 1991. The Blucerchiati’s league title came after a similar eight-year timeframe of reaching Coppa Italia finals, winning the Cup Winners’ Cup and building a mentality and momentum that made the impossible possible.

Atalanta are at that stage of maturity now. They have even shown this season that they know how to suffer, coming through a difficult August when Koopmeiners and Lookman agitated for moves and injuries forced Marten de Roon, a midfielder, and Matteo Ruggeri, a wing-back, to play in the back three.

All of that has made them stronger. Going toe-to-toe with Madrid will also only add to Atalanta’s conviction. This team has what it takes. Even in defeat, Atalanta seemed to make another stride to a greater future victory in Italy.

So, let the fans in the Pisani sing in defiance. “Vin-ce-RE-mooo! Vin-ce-RE-moooo! Vin-ce-RE-mooo il tricolor!”

(Top photo: Image Photo Agency/Getty Images)

James Horncastle covers Serie A for The Athletic. He joins from ESPN and is working on a book about Roberto Baggio.