El Derbi Madrileno: When do Real Madrid and Atletico Madrid play each other in 2023/24?

La Liga is one of the most widely watched football leagues in the entire world, up there with the Premier League, Serie A and the Bundesliga. It is often regarded as the second most prominent league due to having Real Madrid and Barcelona.

As well as those two giants, having Atletico Madrid, Sevilla, Valencia, Athletic Club and more make it a fascinating league full of historic clubs with different fortunes in the modern day. Like any league, it is also packed with great derbies and rivalries.

One of the absolute best is the Derbi Madrileno, or the Madrid derby. The dynamic between Real Madrid, arguably the biggest and most successful club in the world, and an Atletico Madrid side that has not been far behind them in the last decade or so is really fascinating.

Here is when you can expect to see this rivalry in action during the 2023/24 campaign, as well as some background on who has come out on top more often.

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The first meeting between the two sides is going to come pretty early in the new La Liga season which means there could still be an element of mystery about just how good either side is.

Real Madrid really struggled domestically during the 2022/23 campaign, whilst Atletico Madrid ended the season in really, really impressive form. That is why there was actually just a single point between second and third when the season ended, with Real Madrid just grabbing the runners-up spot behind Barcelona.

The first clash is going to be on September 24 at the Wanda Metropolitano. The Atleti fans will hope they are tight to Real Madrid in the table at that point and will want to move ahead of their city rivals with a win on home turf.

An early derby in September means that the second one will not have a major bearing on the run-in of either side. The second Madrid derby will be on February 4, 2024, at the Estadio Santiago Bernabeu.

Much like El Clasico between Real Madrid and Barcelona, it is quite common for these two sides to meet more than once in a season. The Copa del Rey will often throw them together and in the past decade, the Champions League made a habit of it as well.

The spoils in 2022/23 certainly belonged to Real Madrid, although there was plenty of drama in each of the games. The first league clash featured a red card for Mario Hermoso, while the Copa match went to extra time and saw Stefan Savic get sent off.

The final clash was 0-0 until Jose Maria Gimenez put Atleti 1-0 up with 12 minutes to play. 18-year-old striker Alvaro Rodriguez then came on and scored his first La Liga goal to equalise in the 85th minute. Sticking to the theme, Angel Correa had been sent off for Atleti earlier in the game.

There has been an incredible 215 matches between Real Madrid and Atletico Madrid over the years. As you would expect, it is Los Blancos who have got the better record and it would take a sustained miracle over many years for it to swing the other way.

Outside of La Liga, this derby really captured the imagination when they faced each other in the Champions League finals of 2013/14 and 2015/16, as well as the quarter-finals in 2014/15.