Atletico's season falling apart after consecutive losses to Real Madrid and Barcelona

MADRID (AP) — In just a matter of days, one of Atletico Madrid’s most promising seasons turned into great disappointment.

Playing well and with confidence, Atletico looked poised for a deep run in the Champions League, and was holding steady at the top of the Spanish league, in position to fight for both titles.

Then came a pair of setbacks, both at home and in heart-breaking fashion. First it was a penalty shootout loss to Real Madrid in the round of 16 in the Champions League last Wednesday, and four days later a 4-2 defeat against Barcelona in the Spanish league after Diego Simeone's team had led 2-0 midway through the second half.

Simeone was left searching for answers for the team's sudden struggles, and looking for ways to put it back on track for what is left of the season.

“What can we do?” the head coach said. “On Wednesday we get back to training, with the same motivation as always, with the same spirit, and accepting that it is what it is.”

Simeone wasn't giving up yet on the title race in the Spanish league, but Sunday's loss meant that Atletico fell four points behind both Madrid — which won 2-1 at Villarreal on Saturday — and league leader Barcelona, which has a game in hand and can potentially increase its gap to Atletico to seven points.

“Barcelona has an important advantage,” Simeone said. “We have to be realistic, but we will keep going match by match until the end.”

Atletico looked in control against Barcelona at the Metropolitano Stadium. But Barcelona was able to equalize with goals six minutes apart in the 72nd and 78th minutes, and got the victory with a pair of goals in stoppage time.

Against Madrid in the Champions League, Atletico looked in position to finally end its long slump against its city rival in the competition, but it couldn't come through a penalty shootout despite playing better during most parts of the tie.

In the shootout, a rare double touch by Atletico forward Julián Álvarez while taking his penalty led to yet another elimination.

Simeone didn't want to blame his team's defeats to bad luck, though he acknowledged that it played a part. He also noted his side needed to be more assertive at key points in matches, especially when it was playing better and could have sealed victory.

Against Barcelona, Simeone took some blame by saying that he should have made a change quicker than he did, adding defender José María Giménez sooner into the game.

“When we went up 2-0, I should have added Giménez earlier, before they restarted the match,” Simeone said. “But they restarted and scored the first goal, and then came the second.”

Simeone defended his players, saying they "have given it all, they have always competed and the fans have recognized that.”

Atletico visits Espanyol after the international break before hosting Barcelona again in the second leg of the semifinals of the Copa del Rey, a competition Atletico hasn't won since 2013, not long after Simeone took over.

The teams drew 4-4 in Barcelona in the first match last month, when Atletico was losing 4-2 until the 84th. Madrid and Real Sociedad are in the other semifinal, with Madrid having won 1-0 away in the first leg.

AP soccer: https://apnews.com/hub/soccer

Atletico Madrid's head coach Diego Simeone sits on the bench prior to a La Liga soccer match between Atletico Madrid and FC Barcelona at the Metropolitano stadium in Madrid, Sunday, March 16, 2025. (AP Photo/Bernat Armangue)

Atletico Madrid's head coach Diego Simeone sits on the bench prior to a La Liga soccer match between Atletico Madrid and FC Barcelona at the Metropolitano stadium in Madrid, Sunday, March 16, 2025. (AP Photo/Bernat Armangue)

Barcelona's Pau Cubarsi, left, challenges Atletico Madrid's Alexander Sorloth during a La Liga soccer match between Atletico Madrid and FC Barcelona at the Metropolitano stadium in Madrid, Sunday, March 16, 2025. (AP Photo/Bernat Armangue)

Atletico Madrid's Rodrigo Riquelme, bottom, falls on the pitch challenged by Barcelona's Robert Lewandowski during a La Liga soccer match between Atletico Madrid and FC Barcelona at the Metropolitano stadium in Madrid, Sunday, March 16, 2025. (AP Photo/Bernat Armangue)

Atletico Madrid's goalkeeper Jan Oblak, left, dives but fails to save the goal from Barcelona's Ferran Torres during a La Liga soccer match between Atletico Madrid and FC Barcelona at the Metropolitano stadium in Madrid, Sunday, March 16, 2025. (AP Photo/Bernat Armangue)

DALLAS (AP) — Unredacted files related to the 1963 assassination of President John F. Kennedy were released Tuesday evening.

About 2,200 files consisting of over 63,000 pages were posted on the website of the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration. The vast majority of the National Archives’ collection of over 6 million pages of records, photographs, motion pictures, sound recordings and artifacts related to the assassination had previously been released.

President Donald Trump told reporters on Monday that the release was coming, though he estimated it at about 80,000 pages.

“We have a tremendous amount of paper. You’ve got a lot of reading,” Trump said while visiting the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington.

There is an intense interest in details related to the assassination, which has spawned countless conspiracy theories.

Here are some things to know:

Shortly after he was sworn into office, Trump ordered the release of the remaining classified files related to the assassination

He directed the national intelligence director and attorney general to develop a plan to release the records. The order also aimed to declassify the remaining federal records related to the 1968 assassinations of Sen. Robert F. Kennedy and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.

After signing the order, Trump handed the pen to an aide and directed that it be given to Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the Trump administration's top health official. He's the nephew of John F. Kennedy and son of Robert F. Kennedy. The younger Kennedy, whose anti-vaccine activism has alienated him from much of his family, has said he isn’t convinced that a lone gunman was solely responsible for his uncle's assassination.

When Air Force One carrying JFK and first lady Jacqueline Kennedy touched down in Dallas, they were greeted by a clear sky and enthusiastic crowds. With a reelection campaign on the horizon the next year, they went to Texas for a political fence-mending trip.

But as the motorcade was finishing its parade route downtown, shots rang out from the Texas School Book Depository building. Police arrested 24-year-old Lee Harvey Oswald, who had positioned himself from a sniper’s perch on the sixth floor. Two days later, nightclub owner Jack Ruby fatally shot Oswald during a jail transfer.

A year after the assassination, the Warren Commission, which President Lyndon B. Johnson established to investigate, concluded that Oswald acted alone and that there was no evidence of a conspiracy. But that didn't quell a web of alternative theories over the decades.

In the early 1990s, the federal government mandated that all assassination-related documents be housed in a single collection in the National Archives and Records Administration. The collection was required to be opened by 2017, barring any exemptions designated by the president.

Trump, who took office for his first term in 2017, had said that he would allow the release of all of the remaining records but ended up holding some back because of what he called the potential harm to national security. And while files continued to be released during President Joe Biden’s administration, some remain unseen.

The National Archives says that the vast majority of its collection of over 6 million pages of records, photographs, motion pictures, sound recordings and artifacts related to the assassination have already been released.

Researchers have estimated that 3,000 files or so haven’t been released, either in whole or in part. And last month, the FBI said that it had discovered about 2,400 new records related to the assassination. The agency said then that it was working to transfer the records to the National Archives to be included in the declassification process.

Around 500 documents, including tax returns, were not subject to the 2017 disclosure requirement.

Some of the documents from previous releases have offered details on the way intelligence services operated at the time, including CIA cables and memos discussing visits by Oswald to the Soviet and Cuban embassies during a trip to Mexico City just weeks before the assassination. The former Marine had previously defected to the Soviet Union before returning home to Texas.

One CIA memo describes how Oswald phoned the Soviet Embassy while in Mexico City to ask for a visa to visit the Soviet Union. He also visited the Cuban Embassy, apparently interested in a travel visa that would permit him to visit Cuba and wait there for a Soviet visa. On Oct. 3, more than a month before the assassination, he drove back into the United States through a crossing point at the Texas border.

Another memo, dated the day after Kennedy’s assassination, says that according to an intercepted phone call in Mexico City, Oswald communicated with a KGB officer while at the Soviet Embassy that September. The releases have also contributed to the understanding of that time period during the Cold War, researchers said.

FILE - Newly-elected President Kennedy posed for first pictures at his White House desk, Jan. 21, 1961, before plunging into a busy round of conferences. (AP Photo/Bill Achatz, File)

FILE - Part of a file, dated April 5, 1964, details efforts to trace Lee Harvey Oswald's travel from Mexico City back to the United States, is photographed in Washington, Oct. 26, 2017. (AP Photo/Jon Elswick, File)

FILE - President John F. Kennedy waves from his car in a motorcade approximately one minute before he was shot, Nov. 22, 1963, in Dallas. Riding with President Kennedy are first lady Jacqueline Kennedy, right, Nellie Connally, second from left, and her husband, Texas Gov. John Connally, far left. (AP Photo/Jim Altgens, File)

FILE - Part of a file, dated Nov. 24, 1963, quoting FBI director J. Edgar Hoover as he talks about the death of Lee Harvey Oswald, is photographed in Washington, Oct. 26, 2017. (AP Photo/Jon Elswick, File)