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Sick Saul goal gets Atletico going in 4-2 Champions League win at Leverkusen

Saul Niguez
Better call … (Getty Images)

The first leg between last year’s losing Champions League finalists Atletico Madrid and Bayer Leverkusen in their round of 16 tie went more or less as you’d expect. Atletico, after all, is the heavy favorite and rolled to a 4-2 victory.

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Leverkusen is having a down year, slumping to eighth place in the Bundesliga. And while Atletico isn’t exactly at its best, either, the La Liga side’s firepower is awesome and its defense remains one of the best around.

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We’d be remiss, however, if we didn’t share this stunner by Saul Niguez with you.

In the 17th minute, Saul, whose favorite move is basically an Arjen Robben impression, cut inside from the right wing and curled in a pearl of a goal with his left.

Antoine Griezmann would get the second, finishing off Kevin Gameiro’s breakaway. Karim Bellarabi briefly made a game of it after halftime. And after Gameiro scored on a penalty, Stefan Savic had an unlucky own goal for Atletico. But Fernando Torres got a late insurance tally, meaning that Atletico goes home with a two-goal lead and no less than four away goals in their back pockets.

Which, again, we kind of expected. Atletico are likely headed to their fourth consecutive quarterfinals and are very much capable of reaching a third final in four years – losing the 2016 and 2014 championship games to cross-town rivals Real Madrid.

Which is all well and good, but instead of thinking of any of that, let’s just watch the Saul goal again.

Leander Schaerlaeckens is a soccer columnist for Yahoo Sports. Follow him on Twitter @LeanderAlphabet.