Premier League champions Leicester City travel to Spain on the back of a fine form and will relish their chances against a much more experienced Champions League side, Atletico Madrid who are keen to make one step closer to replicating last year’s result and make it into the final of the coveted competition.

Atletico’s big chance

Many were prone to believe that Atletico Madrid have been given the most favourable draw in the quarterfinal of the Champions League, but the experienced tactician such as Diego Simeone knows much better than to take Foxes lightly. The charismatic Argentinean has been doing miracles with Los Rojiblancos during his six-year stay at Vicente Calderon, bagging A Copa del Rey crown and La Liga title during that time. Simeone still fell short to win the biggest prize on two occasions and the quarterfinal tie against the English champions brings a big chance for Atletico Madrid and their boss to come a huge step closer to realising their Champions League dream. There is a sense of optimism ahead of the Wednesday match at Vicente Calderon at Atletico Madrid, a feeling that will be boosted by the fact that Rojiblancos won 16 of their last 21 matches at home. Their knockout-stage stats are particularly impressive as Atletico Madrid managed 15 clean sheets in the last 17 matches on home ground. Atletico are coming from a 1-1 draw against city rivals Real Madrid in La Liga, which remains a lost cause so Simeone’s men can now shift all of their focus to the Champions League.

Tiago Mendes, Augusto Fernandez and Sime Vrsaljko have been confirmed as absentees for the forthcoming fixture, whereas there is still a huge question mark over the availability of Kevin Gameiro and Nico Gaitan.

Leicester’s dream continues

Contrary to their Premier League exploits this season, which have seen their fair share of ups and downs and ultimately resulted in the sacking of the dream-maker Claudio Ranieri, Leicester City have been in rather impressive form in Europe. The Foxes topped Group G in front of Portugal giants FC Porto and managed to seal a surprising win in the knockout stages over Spanish side Sevilla despite a 2-1 loss in the first leg at Ramon Sanchez Pizjuan Stadium. The 2-0 home win in the reverse leg should be credited to Craig Shakespeare, Leicester City new manager who made an easy transition to Ranieri’s right-hand man to boss with five wins in five matches before the Sunday’s loss to Everton. Shakespeare has got the Foxes playing like the last season’s title-winning side and with moral and confidence back up, Leicester City travel to Spain confident of a positive result. Atletico Madrid will be a completely different challenge to Sevilla, but Leicester City lost only two of eight Champions League matches thus far which is enough to suggest they could pull an upset against the last-season’s finalists.

Foxes skipper Wes Morgan is out with back injury with Yohan Benalouane ready to continue in his place. Shakespeare rested a couple of first-team stars last time out and we should expect to see Danny Simpson, Christian Fuchs, Wilfred Ndidi and Riyad Mahrez back in the squad.

Verdict

Atletico Madrid have a tendency to grind the result out and we are confident hosts will do their utmost to triumph on Wednesday night. With Leicester City back in good form this could be an eye-pleasing affair, but a low-scoring one as well.

Top pick: Under 1.5 goals   4.00 (3/1) Betfair

Alternative pick 1: Both teams to score – No   1.60 (3/5) @BetVictor

Alternative pick 2: Atletico Madrid to win to Nil   1.85 (17/20) @Ladbrokes