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Atletico Madrid tore Barcelona isolated with 4 first-half goals to unafraid a 4-0 triumph connected Thursday (February 12, 2026) successful the archetypal leg of their Copa del Rey semi-final, leaving the holders staring astatine a adjacent intolerable task in the instrumentality match.
Diego Simeone's broadside needed lone 45 minutes astatine home to prehend power of the tie, capitalising connected a calamitous early mistake earlier carving Hansi Flick's squad unfastened astatine volition to determination to the brink of April's last successful Seville.
Atletico took the pb successful the sixth infinitesimal successful bonzer fashion. Barcelona defender Eric Garcia rolled a regular walk back, but goalkeeper Joan Garcia, already scanning upfield, allowed the shot to gaffe nether his footwear and towards goal. His hopeless dive came excessively precocious arsenic it had crossed the line.
Eight minutes aboriginal they doubled their pb with a flowing move. Ademola Lookman collected a agelong shot connected the near and fed Julian Alvarez, who switched play to Nahuel Molina. The close backmost slipped a clever walk wrong for Antoine Griezmann, who controlled smoothly and guided the shot into the bottommost corner.
Atletico Madrid's Julian Alvarez, centre, challenges for the shot with Barcelona's Pau Cubarsi, right, and Frenkie de Jong | Photo Credit: AP
The third goal, successful the 33rd minute, was different counter. Giuliano Simeone drove down the close and crossed debased to Alvarez, who squared for an unmarked Lookman to occurrence into the bottommost corner.
Flick reacted by sending connected Robert Lewandowski successful the 37th infinitesimal for Marc Casado. The alteration did small to stem the tide.
Lookman, Alvarez combine
Instead, Atletico struck again earlier halftime. Lookman and Alvarez combined erstwhile more, the Englishman sliding a walk into the centre for the Argentine to unleash a onslaught into the apical country from conscionable wrong the box.
Barcelona dominated possession with 70% successful the archetypal half, but it was Atletico's objective transitions that did the damage.
Atletico goalkeeper Juan Musso denied Fermin Lopez aboriginal successful the 2nd fractional arsenic Barca searched for a lifeline earlier the March 3 instrumentality limb astatine Camp Nou.
They thought they had 1 successful the 52nd infinitesimal erstwhile Pau Cubarsi turned successful a rebound from a escaped kick, lone for the effort to beryllium ruled retired for offside aft a lengthy VAR reappraisal lasting astir six minutes.
Atletico remained unsafe and astir added a 5th precocious on. Substitute Alex Baena was racing done unmarked successful the 86th infinitesimal erstwhile Garcia brought him down from behind. The referee initially produced a yellowish paper but upgraded it to a consecutive reddish after consulting the pitchside monitor.
"It was crazy. Even much truthful against Barca," defender Marcos Llorente told Movistar Plus.
"The squad did everything right. We stuck unneurotic astatine the back, we didn't beryllium back, we pressed precocious up the pitch, we broke up the abstraction truly well. Everything went our way."
The winners of the necktie volition look Real Sociedad oregon Athletic Bilbao successful the final. Real Sociedad hold a 1-0 vantage up of their 2nd limb successful San Sebastian connected March 4.
