Atalanta v Valencia: Champions League last 16 – live!

4 mins: Parejo brings down Gomez right on the edge of the penalty area, and the first shot of the night will surely follow from the free kick.

3 mins: There has already been one team change: Mattia Caldara is in the starting XI for Atalanta, replacing Berat Djimsiti, who was injured in the warm-up.

They are out, have shaken all the hands and tossed all the coins.

I’m all for a bit of security, but it seems extraordinarily mean to hide the Valencia fans up there.

England’s very own Michael Oliver will be wielding the whistle this evening, and by the looks of things is quite happy about it:

Valencia make just the one change to the team that drew 2-2 against Atletico Madrid on Friday: Gabriel Paulista drops out of the squad entirely, suspended for headbutting Ajax’s Dusan Tadic back in the group stage, and Mouctar Diakhaby comes into the defence.

No Luis Muriel in Atalanta’s starting line-up, which is perhaps not a great surprise as he’s been a substitute more often than not this season, but Duvan Zapata has almost always started when fit. Gasperini did talk at his press conference yesterday about life without him:

With Zapata, we had some great results last year. This year we missed him for a long time and we found alternatives. Sometimes we used Luis Muriel, sometimes we didn’t field a specialised striker. This has enriched us, giving us alternatives. We have always been prolific in the penalty area and this is an asset that we can use in upcoming game.

The team sheets are in, and the names upon them are these:

Atalanta: Golloni, Toloi, Palomino, Djimsiti; Hateboer, De Roon, Freuler, Gosens; Pasalic; Ilicic, Gomez. Subs: Sportiello, Caldara, Tameze, Muriel, Malinovskyi, Castagne, Zapata.
Valencia: Domenech; Wass, Mangala, Diakhaby, Gaya; Ferran Torres, Parejo, Kondogbia, Soler; Goncalo Guedes, Maxi Gomez. Subs: Cillessen, Correia, Costa, Gameiro, Cheryshev, Sobrino, Gutierrez.
Referee: Michael Oliver (England).

Atalanta, eh? In the Champions League knock-out rounds, of all places. Who’d have thought it? It’s a throwback to the days when the likes of Videoton, Mechelen and Carl Zeiss Jena could get into European finals, days when fans of almost any club, almost any where, could dream of their team one day being Pretty Good Actually. Not like now, when everything’s been ruined by [insert gripe of choice here].

And this might not be the last of it. Atalanta are not only in the Champions League places again this year, they’re the top-scoring side in Serie A by a standard country mile, and in Josip Ilicic and Luis Muriel they have the division’s fourth and sixth highest scorers. In the last couple of months there have been two 5-0 wins and a 7-0 away victory at Torino, and a total between them and their opponents of 35 goals in nine games at nearly four goals per match. Between them and Valencia there has been a total of one goalless draw all season.

In short, a jolly good time is guaranteed for all. Well, not exactly guaranteed, but likely. Probable, let’s go with probable. People are already having a good time. Look, here’s proof:

So, to summarise, welcome! We’re amount to have a tremendous amount of fun. Now, here’s some pre-match reading: