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Super Eagles forward Ademola Lookman is set to lead the Atletico Madrid attack when they travel to Marseille for a pre-season friendly on Friday, Afrik Foot reports, with the former Atalanta man stepping into an even more prominent role following the departure of Antoine Griezmann and a muscular injury to Alexander Sorloth.
It is the final warm-up fixture for both clubs before their domestic seasons begin, with Marseille hosting Strasbourg in the Ligue 1 opener on Friday, August 21, 2026 and Atletico Madrid welcoming Malaga to the Metropolitano for the La Liga curtain-raiser on Wednesday, August 19, 2026.
Marseille vs Atletico Madrid Preview and Recent Form
Marseille have won four of their five pre-season friendlies under Habib Beye, who replaced Roberto De Zerbi in February 2026 after a 5-0 defeat to PSG.
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The results read well on paper: 3-0 against Yamoussoukro FC, 2-1 against Nimes, 3-0 against Al-Shahaniya and 3-1 against Athletic Club, with 11 goals scored across those five matches.
The sole blemish was a 0-3 home defeat to Nice at the Orange Velodrome, a result that exposed a centre-back pairing of Leonardo Balerdi and Derek Cornelius still searching for cohesion.
The French club finished fifth in Ligue 1 2025-26 with 59 points, and the summer transfer window has stripped the squad of its primary attacking weapons: Mason Greenwood (16 league goals, departed to Fenerbahce), Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang (sold to Deportivo de A Coruna) and goalkeeper Geronimo Rulli (transferred to Manchester City).
Atletico Madrid arrive in France with a 2W-3L record across their last five matches, though two of those defeats came in the final rounds of La Liga 2025-26, and the pre-season losses to Manchester United (1-2) and Manchester City (1-3) featured heavily rotated squads with multiple academy players.
Diego Simeone’s side finished fourth in La Liga and reached the Champions League semi-finals last season, but ended 25 points behind champions Barcelona.
The squad has undergone significant surgery this summer: Griezmann, the club’s all-time top scorer with 211 goals in 488 appearances, left for Orlando City on a free transfer, while Thiago Almada joined River Plate and Clement Lenglet was loaned to Benfica.
More immediately, Nahuel Molina completed a transfer to Roma on August 12, 2026, stripping Simeone of his first-choice right back, and a day earlier the club confirmed Sorloth would miss this fixture and the La Liga opener with a muscular contracture.
Marseille vs Atletico Madrid Head-to-Head Record
These two sides have met three times, all in UEFA competition, and Marseille have never won any of them.
The most recent encounter was the 2018 Europa League final in Lyon, where Atletico won 3-0 through a Griezmann double and a goal from Gabi.
The other two meetings came in the Champions League group stage in 2008-09: Atletico won 2-1 at home before a goalless draw at the Velodrome.
All three matches are more than eight years old, so they carry no predictive weight for this fixture, but the pattern of Atletico control is notable context.
Team News: Injuries, Doubts and Predicted Lineups
Marseille have lost at least 10 players from their 2025-26 squad, including three of their most important performers: Greenwood, Aubameyang and Rulli.
Defenders Facundo Medina (Bayer Leverkusen), Nayef Aguerd and Benjamin Pavard have all departed, as have midfielders Junior Traore (Genoa) and Bilal Nadir (Hamburger SV).
Adrien Rabiot and Jonathan Rowe also left following an internal incident reported by the French press.
The new arrivals, Timothy Weah from Juventus, Tochukwu Nnadi from Zulte Waregem and Himad Abdelli from Angers, add depth but do not directly replace the goals that left with Greenwood and Aubameyang.
Nnadi, the Super Eagles midfielder, has been part of the pre-season squad and appeared from the bench in recent friendlies.
Jeffrey De Lange, a Dutch goalkeeper, has taken the gloves following Rulli’s departure to Manchester City and started the last two warm-up matches.
Atletico’s team news is shaped by two fresh absences: Molina’s transfer to Roma removes the natural right-back option, and Sorloth’s muscular injury confirmed on August 12, 2026 rules him out of both this match and the La Liga opener against Malaga.
Lee Kang-in (signed from PSG for 40 million euros), Morten Hjulmand (Sporting CP, 40 million) and Alejandro Grimaldo (Bayer Leverkusen) are the headline summer arrivals, though none featured in a starting role against Manchester City.
The lineup Simeone used against City on August 9, 2026 included academy defenders Jorge Dominguez and Dani Martinez alongside established names Koke and Hjulmand, and a similar mix of youth and experience is expected here.
Marseille predicted XI (4-2-3-1): De Lange; Weah, Balerdi, Cornelius, Emerson; Abdelli, Hojbjerg; Harit, Gomes, Paixao; Gouiri.
Atletico Madrid predicted XI (4-4-2): Oblak; Bonar, Le Normand, Hancko, D Martinez; C Martin, Koke, Hjulmand, Vargas; Mendoza, Lookman.
Star Player Watch: Lookman vs Gouiri
Ademola Lookman, the Super Eagles forward, joined Atletico Madrid from Atalanta in January 2026 and contributed four goals in eight La Liga appearances across the second half of the campaign, alongside seven goals and four assists in 13 Champions League matches that helped the club reach the semi-finals.
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With Sorloth sidelined and Griezmann gone, Lookman is now the senior attacking presence in the squad, and his ability to drift from wide positions into central pockets makes him the most dangerous player on the pitch for this fixture.
Amine Gouiri finished the 2025-26 Ligue 1 season with eight goals and three assists in 22 appearances, and with Greenwood and Aubameyang both gone, the Algerian international is now the main source of goals for a Marseille side that scored 11 times in five pre-season outings.
The Managers: Habib Beye vs Diego Simeone
Habib Beye was appointed Marseille manager on February 18, 2026, replacing De Zerbi after a humiliating 5-0 loss to PSG, and brings an emotional connection to the club having captained Marseille between 2003 and 2007.
This is Beye’s first senior management role at the top level, and his pre-season has been about defining a tactical identity while integrating new signings into a squad that has lost many of its most experienced players.
Diego Simeone has been in charge of Atletico Madrid since December 2011, winning 61% of his 532 matches in charge at an average of 2.05 points per game.
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The Argentine’s challenge this summer has been absorbing the loss of Griezmann while bedding in signings worth more than 80 million euros, and doing so while losing Molina and Sorloth in the final days before the season begins.
Tactical Preview: How Marseille and Atletico Madrid Could Line Up
Beye has settled on a 4-2-3-1 in pre-season, with Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg and Abdelli sitting deep and Angel Gomes operating as the creative link between midfield and the lone striker Gouiri.
The width comes from Amine Harit on the right and Igor Paixao on the left, with Timothy Weah deployed at right back rather than in the advanced role he occupied at Juventus.
Marseille’s weakness is at centre back, where Balerdi and Cornelius have conceded five goals in five friendlies without building a settled partnership, a vulnerability that Atletico’s movement in the final third should target.
Simeone’s 4-4-2, adapted for the absences of Molina and Sorloth, is likely to feature Lookman as one of the two forwards alongside Rodrigo Mendoza, with Obed Vargas and Carlos Martin providing width from midfield.
Hjulmand, the 40-million-euro signing from Sporting CP, gives Atletico a physical presence in central midfield alongside the experience of Koke, who renewed his contract until June 2027.
The makeshift defence, with academy graduates Bonar and Martinez likely to fill the full-back positions, is the area where Marseille can cause damage, particularly through Paixao’s pace on the left flank.
Marseille vs Atletico Madrid Betting Tips and Predictions
Both squads are in transition, and the combination of attacking talent and defensive uncertainty on both sides points towards goals in this fixture.
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