Atletico Madrid limped into the semi-finals of the Europa League despite a 1-0 defeat away at Sporting Lisbon in the second leg of their quarter-final clash in Portugal this evening.
Diego Simeone's men toiled for much of the night at the Estadio Jose Alvalade and were ultimately beaten by Fredy Montero's header, only for the Spanish club to benefit from a 2-0 win in the first leg in order to help them progress with a 2-1 aggregate victory.
Sporting started the better of the two sides and they threatened early on when Marcos Acuna rose highest in the box, but he saw his glancing header fly just wide of Jan Oblak's top corner.
Simeone's charges were well off the pace in the first 45 minutes, Sebastian Coates beating the leap of his marker to draw a fine save from Oblak, who dived with an outstretched right to keep the scores level.
Lisbon continued to cause issues down the flanks and they took the lead when Bruno Fernandes crossed into the box to leave Oblak flapping, before Montero broke free at the back post to head back across goal and make it 1-0.
With very few signs of an Atletico response, Sporting might just have drawn level on aggregate before the interval, although Gelson Martins made a mess at the far post after being found by a wonderful ball from deep courtesy of Acuna.
Atletico were much improved after half time and the visitors' first real chance landed at the feet of Antoine Griezmann, who could only send a tame effort straight at Rui Patricio from a wide and improbable angle.
Sporting still offered glimpses of danger too and Montero might have done better when the ball dropped kindly in the middle of the area, but he could only drill straight into the grateful arms of Oblak.
Griezmann was anonymous for much of the evening but the Frenchman almost made the final 10 minutes more comfortable for Atletico, although he saw his free kick from range fade just a few inches wide with Patricio looking beaten.
The Frenchman was presented with two other opportunities in the closing stages, but once more he came up short as he first fired straight at Patricio, before dragging another wide despite breaking cleverly into space beyond the defence on both occasions.
In the end the misses were not to matter as Sporting failed to create a much-needed surprise late on, leaving Simeone's charges to edge through into the final four after an uncharacteristically lacklustre display on the road.
SPORTING LISBON (3-4-3): Patricio; Pinto, Coates, Mathieu (Petrovic 26'); Acuna, Ristovski (Doumbia 79'), Fernandes, Battaglia; Martins, Ruiz (Ribeiro 70'), Montero
ATLETICO MADRID (4-2-3-1): Oblak; Juanfran, Savic, Godin, Lucas (Vrsaljko 46'); Gabi, Saul, Vitolo (Correa 60'), Koke; Griezmann, Costa (Torres 52')
Christopher Dodd
