Messi's hug to Luis Suárez with which he opened an afternoon that should be a decisive appointment was nothing more than the disturbing metaphor of the afternoon.
Anyone's won.
If anything, only frustration did.
Barcelona and Atlético, protected by Ter Stegen and Oblak, did not know how to overcome themselves.
Just cancel.
So much so that they laid out a carpet on the Camp Nou so that Real Madrid, which would not be the most reliable team, could take the lead if they beat Sevilla.
Fear was the only common thread. First, with tactical prudence. Later, with the urgencies of the fear of chaos. Barcelona had the ball, but neither could nor dared to do something useful with it. It is not that he intended to sleep the game while waiting to find a crack between the three central Atlético. Simply, faced with the impossibility of advancing through the interior corridors through De Jong and Pedri, or finding light in the exteriors with Dest and Alba, he limited himself to trying to postpone the unavoidable. Even more so when Busquets, the only Barça player with clear ideas, the world clouded after seeing how Savic's head hit his as if a jab from Mike Tyson had just rained from the sky. To Busquets, incomprehensibly,the referee had allowed him to re-enter the field even though his body already seemed like a strange entity at the command of his brain. The next play he was sitting on the grass. It is hard to believe that the protocols in Spain are not stricter with these types of shocks.
Only half an hour had passed, and the Catalans, without their compass already in the field, prepared to suffer.
Because Atlético, as Simeone showed it, at least started the afternoon with the greatness of someone who is two feet from glory.
The Argentine coach resisted any temptation to speculate from the same line-up, in which he made a hole for Correa no matter how much Kondogbia could assure him some more cement.
Cholo also bet on the tap of Lemar.
Even though the Frenchman, who wanted to be noticed on such a special day with a shot at dawn, returned to his routine and had to ask for a change at 12 minutes.
As if fate, bloody hell, wanted to do its thing and put the injuries of Arda Turan and Diego Costa on the table of memory that May 2014 in which Atlético were proclaimed league champions at the Camp Nou.
Neither Simeone nor Koeman could correct the absences of Lemar and Busquets well. The Atlético coach rescued Saúl to take care of the right-handed lane, thus Carrasco moving inside. Saúl, sacrificed in the second act by Joao Felix, continued with his disconcerting future. While the Barcelona coach, sanctioned and trapped in the stadium box, pulled his mobile to indicate to his assistants that it was the young man Ilaix Moriba who was escorting two other beardless people like De Jong and Pedri. A pubescent midfield, and before which Atlético wanted to go to the mountains.
The quarter of an hour after the departure of Busquets was a torment for Barcelona.
If I did not kiss the canvas it was because Ter Stegen decided to grow just the week in which his critics began to look for matches for the torches.
The German goalkeeper raised a wall in front of his goal before the attempts of Llorente, Carrasco and Luis Suárez.
Hands and feet served.
What Ter Stegen did not expect - I correct, yes - is that Suárez would use some of those neighborhood tricks that they made so much fortune during his six seasons as a Barça player.
The goalkeeper pulled out his mitt to move the ball away from Suárez's head.
Circumstance that the Uruguayan took advantage of to collapse and claim a penalty that nobody wanted to know anything about.
Ter Stegen snorted visibly annoyed.
Oblak, of course, couldn't be left behind on a capital date.
The Slovenian goal, who has conceded the fewest goals in this league, reappeared just at the moment when his teammates needed him.
And before Leo Messi.
There is nothing.
Given the difficulties, the Rosario decided to command his own war.
He started running like old times.
He left Saul taking root and played with the nerves of up to five rivals, who could not avoid a final scent whip.
It would have been if Oblak's fingers hadn't corrupted someone else's Eden.
But that Atlético who saw how Felipe was left without catching the goal just before the break found a Barcelona that, at the hand of Messi, managed to rehabilitate in the second act.
The Argentine, who tore cards from Koke, Felipe and Saúl, again demanded Oblak's elasticity in a cross foul.
By then, Hermoso had taken the moment of his life from Ilaix and Piqué had threatened with a header.
Although much closer was Araujo, formidable after replacing Mingueza, an ordeal for Carrasco, and whose header to the net was canceled for offside.
Dembélé, to whom Koeman entrusted the miracle, discovered that he is not the best header in the world.
And Messi, who never tired of trying, lost his booty in an already twilight foul with which everything ended.
Barcelona, once again, lost their great opportunity to snatch the lead from Atlético.
The rojiblancos, meanwhile, did not know how to close a League that is still trapped in their windpipe.
SImeone fled to the locker room once the referee put an end to the uneasiness.
It was curious to admire his stamp.
Always in black, like a gravedigger waiting for someone to bury.
Like Johnny Cash, who sang that he would like to dress every day in the colors of the rainbow.
"But I'll try to carry a little darkness on my back."
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