Atlanta United returned home to the Benz Saturday night after a busy road trip that saw them bag a respectable four points against D.C. United and St. Louis City. The match saw Rob Valentino take the helm for his fourth game since Gonzalo Pineda was fired, rolling out a back five to combat Toronto’s talented Italian playmakers. Ultimately the Five Stripes came away with A 2-1 WIN WHAT DID WE JUST WITNESS, so here are your final whistle thoughts from Mercedes-Benz Stadium!
Thiago Almada
We’ve all heard the Thiago Almada rumors; they’ve been reported here, there, and everywhere. While it’s clear the young Argentine may very well be on his way out sooner than later, Atlanta has to pounce on every moment he can still provide here in the Deep South. His first half goal was the culmination of the give-and-go style this team has tried to force while inside the final third a ton this season, and it provided the momentum needed going into the locker room.
Unfortunately, that momentum didn’t carry into the opening of the second half, as Atlanta gave up a goal almost immediately, but when Almada plays well he tends to elevate those around him. If this was the last match we see him in a Five Stripe kit, we’ll always have a library of golazos and fond memories to look back on.
Corners and crosses
On both sides of the ball, Atlanta United seemed flatter than normal as balls were whipped into the box. The first half Toronto overturned goal came from the defense being heavily bunched up, which left Insigne able to pick an easy header. Thankfully he was a couple of toes offside, but it simply never felt like the defense looked comfortable defending those angled crosses and shots.
The attack had a similar problem; they created the chances from the flanks but the team struggled to put in a high quality ball for Rios, Silva, or Thiare to pounce on. Most of the opportunities left much to be desired and just felt a step off. While this team is clearly in a transitionary period headed towards the summer transfer window, those small fundamentals, strategies, and functional details are aspects of the game that have to be tightened up to start turning draws into wins.
Caleb Wiley is a winger
This is simply my opinion, but Caleb Wiley just brings more to the team as an outright attacker. Don’t get me wrong, his defending has grown phenomenally over the years, but he was traditionally a winger throughout his youth. If he’s still repping the Five Stripes in a couple of months, it’d be wonderful to see him challenge Xande Silva for time instead of relying on him in the left back position.
He admittedly had a tough time keeping hold of Bernadeschi in this match, but the moments in which he could push forward, he was effective. If the front office could bring in an experienced left back to help shore up an already solid defense, it could make a massive difference with the way Rob Valentino wants to play. Of course, this could be a moot point if Caleb does, in fact, leave for Europe.
The assassin Jamal Thiare
LMAOOOOOOOOO I WAS ABOUT TO POST THIS AND JAMAL JUST ROBBED A MAN BLIND AND WON THE GAME AT THE DEATH AHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAAAAAAAA
Woo…okay. Let us know what y’all thought of the match down below!
Just read that Thiare is out for 2-4 weeks with a shoulder injury he apparently picked up in this game… sigh
Nice to see un on the right side of an inexplicable defensive gaffe for a change.
I watched the entire game, and just watched extended highlights, and can’t understand the complaints about crosses and corners. I saw Lennon alone put five crosses on the forehead or feet of an ATL player in the box. Their goalie made two great stops on real goal opportunities.
Maybe it’s that we have no one who can finish, and thus we shouldn’t be crossing as a tactic, but I just don’t see the basis for saying Lennon had a bad game.
You may be right, but to me is his lack of variety. Please cross to the far post; please cross hard and low into the 6 yard box; please cross back to the incoming midfielders at the half circle; please pull it back when the defender has committed and use your left foot; please cut into the middle and take a left footed shot and please raise your head when crossing.
Dear Atlantistas, I watched some of your game, and highlights. I suppose the Toronto goalkeeper doesn´t have a single friend in his own team, to warn him, right? I mean, it is not like your players is invisible, or maybe he is well informed in the dark arts?
Three points is like money from a prince in Nigeria, you just don´t ask where they come from. So, pocket them. Still, if Almada is leaving, the big Greek guy has already left, then there is a lot of building to be done. An assortment of playerd does not a team make, and most of all, you need the magician who makes these things come together.
And, in that sense, I hope my Atlantista friends are paying some attention to what Tata is doing at Miami. What a great coach!! Last night, they played away, without Messi, and Suarez, and again won. And it is not the score, but the team. Tata placed Busquets in defense, after losing 3 defense players. Miami´s midfield was formed by three super young kids, Bright, Redondo, (these two fromTata´s recruiting), and Chremaschi (from their Academy). The attack had Gressel (and the goals came from his perfect crossings), a pretty B player as a striker, and a very very good, very young kid from Paraguay, Diego Gomez. This entire team was the result of Tata´s master vision, and choice.
This is really what you need to go back to the top. A Tata. Go find him!
EVERY Toronto player except the goalkeeper got the hell quickly up the pitch like it was a goal kick. That’s what led to me being surprised on how the play was legal. I missed that the goalkeeper actually grabbed the ball and it didn’t go out of play behind the goal line. So there was nobody there on Toronto to tell the guy to look behind him. But still, one of the defenders (whoever Wiley shoved) made sure to talk to the goalkeeper after the goal and tell him what a mistake he made, although he was long gone up the pitch by the time it happened.
Our old team president had a choice between keeping Tata or keeping Carlos Bocanegra and he chose Bocanegra. And we’ve been paying for it ever since. Until Boca is fired, I really don’t think the manager is very important here. But yeah, it’s bad to see Miami become the face of MLS when it was supposed to be us and we had to have a miracle “dark arts” play to win late night.
All clubs are in this for life. So, there is always time to make changes, and improve. It is just that Atlanta is taking so long, one feels they have no idea where to go.
And I did not see Soviet Mechanic in the Georgia national team today. And the interesting part is that the Goergia team seems to be formed exclusively by Soviet Mechanics.
Well, the mechanics did Ok for one half, then Spains quality took over.
The difference in quality was too big. The fun thing is that everyone in the Georgia team looked very Georgian. This is probably a country no one migrates to. Wonder why. Oh. Stalin was Goergian, just remembered.
Keep in mind we are only 7 years old and still learning to crawl.
Problem is, you showed all of us how babies can start jumping at age 2. They can. This is about going back to the right path. LAFC never deviated much, I think?
I don’t think Tata was gonna stay anyways. Doesn’t he have a a history of moving on pretty quickly?
I think Tata was gone anyway. He wanted the Mexico job
This is one thing I fell bad about Tata´s work. He knew there was nothing that he could to to make Mexico great, and took the job anyway.
Can we get somebody to write up how what Jamal Thiare did last night was legal? What is that we don’t know that made that legal? I thought until the team doing the goal kick actually put it in play, nobody on the other team, which in this case would specifically be Thiare, was allowed to touch the ball. There must be something that the goalkeeper did that made that legal when normally it would not be legal otherwise late in every match, teams would swarm the goalkeeper if there was a goal kick and they were down by a goal and it would be a bat out of hell race to the ball to see who could get to it first.
In baseball you can do the old hidden ball trick where a fielder never actually gave the ball back to the pitcher and if a runner takes a lead off a base, the fielder can then tag him out. But there are requirements on how to do it and they all have to be satisfied, including that the pitcher can’t actually touch the rubber on the mound for that to be legal. So maybe there is some rule that the goalkeeper broke last night that turned it into a live ball that could lead to a goal.
Easy: it wasn’t a goal kick but a live ball. Keeper was doing standard bit of time wasting after gathering a ball in the box and instead of just punting it, he put it down to try and waste more time.
What Mia said, and also:
https://x.com/atlpilgrim/status/1807447688029278638?s=46&t=97H-mvbbAk4no2YJM3JhPg
Thanks, MSA and TP!
Looking ahead at the schedule and the standings in the East, we could set ourselves up for a solid playoff spot if we keep earning points ahead of the transfer window. While the main priority for us should be advancing in the US Open Cup, we stand a decent chance to climb the table.
Atlanta currently sits tied for 8th with Toronto with a match in hand and ahead in goal differential with 24 points.
Our matches in July are:
Wiley and Almada will leave for the Olympics after the US Open Cup match or the fixture away at Montreal.
RSL and Columbus are the two most challenging matches on that list. Columbus could be without some important players as Morris, Cucho Hernandez, and Schulte have all received interest from abroad and could be on the way to Europe.
Nashville sits 2 points ahead of us. Their next month could be a tough one.
The away matches against Columbus, Portland, and Philadelphia are their most likely opportunities to drop points. Over 5 matches, it is not unreasonable to think Atlanta could overcome the two-point gap between these teams.
Charlotte and NYCFC sit at 32 points. Atlanta has a game in hand over Charlotte with a league match remaining between them at the end of August. 8 points could be a hurdle, but they are about to have a brutal July facing Miami at home before a four-match road trip against Cincinnati, Columbus, Austin, and Philadelphia. They could lose 3 matches this month.
Columbus sits at 33 points with 2 matches in hand over Atlanta. It doesn’t seem likely that we catch up with them unless Nashville, Toronto, LAFC, and Charlotte give us some help this month.
With that in mind, Atlanta could finish July in 5th-6th place in the East if they keep up their current production.
I think this NE game may me the most important as they’re a good team that was on a hot streak until this past weekend. We really need to win that game, and if we do, then we’re set up nicely for the rest of the month. They can also close the gap on us with a W and push us further from the playoffa
+3 in the most insane way – I will take it. We are still closer to the bottom than we are to sixth place so the points are extremely valuable. Just keep getting results , we can’t climb out of the valley in one step.
Wow, what an ending. I was very pleasantly surprised by the crowd. I thought the stadium would be empty but this is showing there is a hard core group of followers, which is awesome. Ugly win with a great ending; winning like that makes it for a fun evening. Scratching and clawing our way for points was missing (a little good luck helps). Happy to see a lot more kids. A little girl and boy behind us just were hilarious when we scored.
All true but it’s the most empty seats I remember seeing and I’ve been to just about all of them. Hopefully when management sees concession receipts they’ll get the message we’re not going to settle for this shit much longer.
Glad they’re winning! But I don’t see this lasting with basically a B team in the pitch.
The Benz absolutely erupted. It has been a long time since the crowd reached that level of elation. Boy did it feel good.
LOL back in the mid ’90s, I scored many a goal on EA Sports FIFA on the Pony Slaystation in precisely the manner Thiare just did!
We need Saba back… we’re generally a very stout team defensively with Greg and Williams back there, but our offense is poor at best. Xande seems to run a lot, but I don’t really see a lot of end product from him. Lennon was particularly awful today, just constantly playing backwards and no offensive momentum.
Almada was a bright spot as was Thiarre. Rios is…bad.
Yeah, the one worrisome aspect is our offense has not been consistent. Golazo, penalty, and Thiarre make up 3 of the 4 goals from last 3 games.
Silva just haven’t looked as effective whenever we are play 3-5-2. It is interesting where I understand having 3 CB has shored up the team defensively, but it makes our offensive less deadly…
I agree, perhaps he’s just more effective out wide
The crosses from Lennon have been consistently bad this year as well. My opinion on Silva is his end product was lacking because he was paired with Rios. Rios isn’t Jahn or Berry bad, but he isn’t far off. Besides the give and go with Almada, he didn’t provide anything.
Anything can happen, but Georgia’s chances can’t be great today vs. Spain. Saba might be back soon.
I’m hoping he’s back for RSL game as that’s going to be a very tough one
Rios = Miguel Berry 2.0
Agreed and I’m pretty sure they had similar backgrounds when we signed them, so not sure why we didn’t learn from the Miguel episode..
Rios was basically an emergency signing. Garth has talked about how we have had no money going into the season, and no one expected both GG and Thiarre would both get injured at the start of the season. To judge if Rios is a bad signing or not, we would have to see if there was anyone better at that price point. It doesn’t stop him from being bad, but at least it makes FO decision a little more understandable.
We are a meme machine
I really feel for the keeper. He played so well all game and was one of their best players. Yet his teammates quickly removed the prior 90 minutes from their memory and berated their goalkeeper for his mistake. In that moment, you need someone to console you. I get that he is a grown man but it is a devastating moment for him. And it is the defenders fault. I mean they are backing up FACING THEIR OWN GOALKEEPER. TELL HIM “HEY TURN AROUND!” Or “Man on.” Like bruh whatever I am glad they made the mistake, I just feel for the goalkeeper.
The one animated guy yelling on the replay is yelling support I think. Looks like he’s saying ‘it’s fine”. Looked like most of the team gave him a hug after the game. Even Guzan said something to him. I don’t think anyone was berating him.
I thought I read his lips as “that’s you” but I’m not sure.
After the match he was being supported for sure though.
I’m glad Toronto made the mistake also and that the GK shouldn’t feel like it’s the end of the world just because of that one play. However, to your point you can see on the replay that at least one of the Toronto FC players (by the ref) turned around before the attempted goal kick & is signaling with a hand up pointing behind the Keeper before he even puts the ball on the ground that something is off behind him.
Man I. Really wish we could have seen that live instead of them being in the middle of a replay. All we saw was the very end. We kinda got robbed of the thrill of realizing what he was about to do
Man and I was bouta go to the match too…
Worse, was the fans leaving at the 87th minute! Suckers…..
Or the ones who were fleeing up the stairs once the goalie got that ball. It was a mad dash up and then they all missed it! Haha
What did I just watch!!!!
Last minute and Atlanta United bouta draw 1-1 vs Toronto Thiare: ☝️However