We’re back baby… sigh…
Things did not go according to plan for Atlanta United as it fell 2-0 in its visit to Los Angeles Galaxy late on Saturday night.
Although there were some positive signs as far as build up and passing, it’s clear the team still has work to do if it wants to make the MLS Cup Playoffs.
Rob Valentino rolled out a mostly first-choice starting lineup in a 4-3-3 shape to face the Galaxy. Pedro Amador got his first MLS start playing on the left side of a Derreck Williams and Stian Gregersen center back pairing. Dax McCarty and Bartosz Slisz formed the double-pivot in midfield with Ajani Fortune in the more advanced role. Finally, Xande Silva, Jamal Thiare and Saba Lobjanidze formed the attacking trident.
New designated player Alexey Miranchuk was available off the bench for his Atlanta United debut.
Despite not having much of the ball, Atlanta United showed the work it put in during the past two weeks with sensational passing sequences that led to dangerous chances. Both teams finished the first half with seven shots, but the Five Stripes created 1.3 xG to the Galaxy’s 0.5.
The Five Stripes found the net after 23 minutes courtesy of Thiare, but the goal was called back for offside. Nine minutes later, Silva fired past John McCarthy, but once again it was chalked off due to offside.
Much of the same continued in the second half until two notable players made their MLS debuts in the 62nd minute: Miranchuk for Atlanta and Marco Reus for Los Angeles.
While Miranchuk did not make an instant impact, Reus’ presence provided a cutting edge to the Galaxy as he helped them find more avenues into Atlanta’s box. One of these led to a Williams handball which resulted in an LA Galaxy penalty kick. Joseph Paintsil stepped up to take the spot kick, but Brad Guzan’s heroics kept the game level.
But Guzan couldn’t keep them all out. Los Galacticos insisted with well-crafted passing sequences and got their due reward in the 76th minute with a Riqui Puig rocket into the top corner to give the hosts a 1-0 lead.
The big man Reus himself then sealed the deal for the Galaxy with his first MLS goal to make it 2-0 before the end.
The Galaxy showed why it is top of the Western Conference and Reus showed why he is a world-class soccer player. The team was dominant throughout the game and deserved its win. However, Atlanta United had some positives to consider as well. For starters, the team’s attacking transitions look much more fluid. While it seems to still be missing that final pass, it is seeing some players step up in exciting ways such as Fortune handling pressure very well in midfield.
On the other hand, the club probably has to realize that Miranchuk is unlikely to be the miracle signing Atlanta United needs to carry it into the playoffs. While he is undoubtedly talented, it can’t all fall to one player. Miranchuk struggled to get the ball in this match. The Russian international had 20 touches while Reus got a whopping 42 in the same time. If he is to have anywhere near the impact the Five Stripes need him to have, he’s going to need some help.
Atlanta United will look to return to winning ways on Aug 31 when it travels to face Southeastern rival Charlotte FC at Bank of America Stadium.
What did you think of the match? Let us know in the comments and fill out your player ratings below.
Need to replace that guy whose picture is feature on this article. Need someone that can defend.
I don’t think he was the singular problem last night. He always looks better with a striker to feed.
With all of the other places we really need major help, I’m not sure RB is high on the list for upgrading. We have to get an every-game first choice striker and upgrade at LW. We will need to get a new starting GK as well. Depending on how Amador looks (maybe better than advertised in his limited play to date) that may be a place we need another starter at LB, too. Then address some of the backup roles depending on roster/cap space and typical offseason attrition.
Also, the FB situation depends heavily on the coach and his tactics. If we are moving to 3ATB or the new coach is playing 4ATB and dropping the 6 deeper for the FBs to push high up the field on the attack, Brooks is just fine. I do think he’s a little limited as an attacker but his willingness and effort to run down pretty much anything sent deep over the top is a big asset. His decision making is sometimes questionable when he gets the ball but maybe a new coach and better ST/LW options give him better targets on the crosses. His defending is admittedly a little bit of an adventure at times.
The short version is that there’s a lot of variables in play for how useful Brooks is going forward. He’s little expensive IMO, but he makes up for a lot of shortcomings with an unassailable work rate and good durability.
I completely agree with this. The only position on the team I’m entirely comfortable with is CB. Every other position will have holes to fill or work to do this winter.
The front office has been emphasizing versatility so, hopefully, guys who are locked up for a while will be able to find the right fit under the new manager.
At right-back, Brooks Lennon and Matthew Edwards is not a terrible depth chart. I think we should add another fullback who can be a more attacking option behind Brooks, otherwise, I’m comfortable. That player could be a veteran or a Homegrown Player signing out of college like Remi Okunlola from Clemson. We also still have an option for 2025 to bring back Ronald Hernandez if we need to.
Left-back is a bit shakier. Pedro Amador is our only true left-back on the roster. Dom Chong Qui could be accelerated to the first team by the end of 2025 if we need to but I’d rather shoot for the beginning of 2026 for him. That means we need to sign an Andrew Gutman-style fullback to platoon with Amador.
At goalkeeper, Guzan may decide to retire or come back for his last option year. Cohen hasn’t convinced a lot of the fans in his 11 total appearances this season across all competitions including MLS NEXT PRO. Jayden Hibbert on the other hand has looked quite promising with the 2s. Westberg will be a free agent at the end of the season. If Guzan retires, I’m all for an open competition to see who will be his successor. Hibbert might beat Cohen and whichever veteran MLS free agent we sign to round out the GK room.
Midfield will be interesting. McCarty is already set to retire. Muyumba is under contract through 2026 and Slisz through 2028. Jay Fortune has two option years in 2025 and 2026 in his Homegrown Player contract and may be looking for a new contract with how much the club is starting to rely on him. Adyn Torres won’t be ready next year for meaningful minutes. Even if we sign Carleton, I doubt he will get more than a few minutes, same with Cooper Sanchez who probably spends the whole season with the 2s. Will Reilly could help here, but we also need another experienced player who can fit the #6 destroyer/distributor role. This also includes us probably selling or cutting Sosa and Ibarra.
Miranchuk will probably be fine at the 10 and Firmino is probably fine as a depth option for 10 and wing but we probably want another player who can effectively play 10 depending upon the in-coming coach’s tactics.
The wings need help. Saba is probably our only lock for next season. Silva would agree that the end product has been there as much as he’d like. Mosquera could be up-graded, and Wolff and Brennan are fine as Homegrown Player depth but they aren’t the answer yet.
And the center forward position is likely a rebuild. Thiare and Rios have played admirably. They have done everything we could have asked them to do. Rios is just on a loan with us so we will have to decide if we can/should bring him back. The club has an option for 2025 for Thiare so he could be back, too. We need a clear-choice lead striker and I thoroughly expect that to be our priority in the winter. Neri is under contract with the 2s through the end of 2025 so he could be in consideration for depth.
My shopping list this winter looks something like this:
We have at least 4 senior roster spots to work with, 2 DP spots, at least 2 U-22 spots, and a clear need to open up some international slots through green cards or player transfers.
Yeah I think most people on this and other sites that post “we need to get rid of X” ignores the stupidity that is MLS roster construction. Are there better right backs that we could replace Brooks with? Absolutely! Are there better american RBs we can get for his cap hit? Not really.
And my shopping list is almost exactly the same. It almost feels like Xande got comfortable after we extended his contract. Remember, when we brought him in last year we were his 5th team in 5 years, which is rough when you’re supposed to be in your prime playing years.
Fans of MLS teams talk a lot about the need to allow teams to spend more freely. One change that would have massive impacts, especially with the new rules around Discretionary GAM would be to expand the Senior Roster Spots to 25 from the current maximum of 20. Allowing teams to sign more quality depth above the Senior Minimum threshold of Supplemental Roster Spots will be extremely important as more competitions, international call-ups, and schedule congestion impact league competitiveness. This could also involve the 10+ Supplemental roster spots becoming more tied to the 2s with 2s players freely able to move between the two teams as needed outside of the quirky short-term call-up rules that currently exist.
This all makes sense but we could only manage to find one DP and a replacement level fullback during the summer window when Garth has said many times he prefers to do business. There’s no WAY we’re getting close to all that done in the winter window.
I highly recommend listening to Garth’s in-depth interview with Jason Longshore that came out a few days ago.
We leak goals from that side like a holey pair of socks leaks toes.
this is the result i expected but a much better performance than i expected….at least thru the first 70. credit to valentino for the set up and a big shout-out to fortune who had his best match as a 5 stripe imo. i’m not saying he’s a full-on, thiago replacement 10, but he played like an 8.5 on the pitch. with dax and slisz pretty solid behind him, he was able to really look dangerous and play the facilitator much more.
hopefully there is much more of these kinds of performances to close out the season. i’m still not expecting a playoff position, nor do i particularly care about one at this point. i want to see clear game-plans from rob, heart and effort and creativity like we mostly saw last night, and a lot of youth playing for jobs.
So, to me the question is: how come other teams find very good players on free transfers or with much less transfer fees? OR how come they find U22 players much better than we do?
well those players probably wanted to go to teams that are currently better than Atlanta is right now, especially those on free transfer. U22 players, those issues fall on our FO, which pretty much everyone is beating the drum of removing
Who’s to say some of these players aren’t on the FO’s radar. Management would certainly be failing even worse than they are if they were not.
Look at where these players are going, LA, NY, Miami are much sexier than Atlanta without a manager who can draw that talent.
My perspective for this match and the remaining 8 for this season is that it is an audition or a preseason competition for when we have our new coach and the signings that will come alongside that coach’s vision for the team. This is the opportunity for players to show whether they still have a role to play in the next iteration of this team.
We were not expected to beat LA on the road. Though things fell apart in the last 20-25 minutes, we had a clear game plan that the starters executed pretty well. We were unlucky not to have a goal of our own in the opening 60 minutes since we played like a team that could have stolen at least one point on the road.
Even though he ran out of gas at the end of the match, Jay Fortune had a great game, especially early on when he was playing as an attacking 8. His option years in 2025 and 2026 feel like guarantees at this point.
Guzan had a strong match, too, with very little he could have done on either goal. And that restart pass upfield to the left wing in the second half was a thing of beauty that unfortunately went to waste by the player who received it.
Thiare had one of his better performances despite not scoring.
Despite still learning how to play with this team and while building chemistry on the fly, we could see some of what the front office saw in Miranchuk to go out and get him. Once he’s settled in, he’s going to be fine.
There are plenty of things to criticize but everyone else has that covered.
Again…there have often strong performances from individuals and the team during stretches…it’s been a steady ebb and flow of lackluster performances to strong performances to terrible performances…including many where the team looked decent and just couldn’t get it done. Nothing new.
To add on, here is a quick numbers exercise for this offseason.
With our full squad back in May, we were ranked #11 in the league in team salary at $16.1 million. With Giakoumakis, Almada, Wiley, and McFadden all departing from the club, our current team salary (including dead money for Sosa, Ibarra, and Etienne) is about $10.9 million, near the bottom of the league. If Mirancuk is being paid similarly to the $3.1 million he was set to earn in Italy, that takes us to about $14 million in salary.
That is in the bottom third of the league with more money set to come off of the books this winter and our treasure chest and high-value roster spots ready for the next coach to splash some cash. Though we shouldn’t use Transfermarkt valuation numbers as hard and fast dollar amounts, we can use them as value comparisons in the league. Atlanta United with Miranchuk is now ranked 25th out of 29 teams in squad value between San Jose and Sporting KC.
With options on Sosa ($778,100), Ibarra ($660,000), Hernandez ($450,000), Guzan ($612,500), Thiare ($595,000), and Westburg ($109,000); Dax’s retirement ($256,000), Rios’s ($126,000) loan ending, and Etienne coming off of the books ($710,000), we are potentially going to see a lot more roster turnover. Dax, Rios, Guzan, and Thiare are adding value above their salary threshold so it will be interesting to see who can replicate those impacts on the next roster.
Abram ($872,000), Silva ($604,000), Lennon ($740,000), Williams ($448,000), Mosquera ($437,000), and Cohen ($304,000) are guaranteed for 2025 with options for 2026.
Of our Homegrown players, Fortune, Wolff, and Morales are on option year decisions by the club. I think all three return for at least the 2025 season.
That Mosquera salary really stands out as a HUGE mistake/error.
Thanks to the U-22 designation, he only counts $200k against the cap, so there’s that silver lining.
Mosquera’s biggest strength has always been his speed, simply put. He sucks with ball handling, he doesn’t do well winning balls back from the defense, and he always looks out of place.
Abram’s hit is higher than that because of his transfer as well. If we can sell him that would be amazing.
His annual amortized transfer fee impact is only about $82,400 for a grand total of about $954,000.
Thanks for the work and the summary. I’m really surprised we rank that low in payroll even before losing GG and the others. Given that amount of room surely it’s reasonable to expect a new coach to have enough room to make the team his own and do something to get us out of the swamp.
Adding a bit to this with stats from this season.
Through 26 matches played, we are ranked #19 in the league in total goals scored at 34 between Seattle and Houston. We are #4 in the league in xG (Expected Goals) with 51.14 or an underperformance of about 13 goals on the season through 26 matches. The teams ahead of us are vastly more efficient and effective in their scoring with Portland scoring 53 goals on 51.19 xG, LA Galaxy scoring 52 goals in 53.23 xG and Colorado scoring 47 on 56.11 xG. We have taken the 6th most shots in the league with 388 recorded, but are ranked 14th in the league with 128 of those shots on target for a #24 ranked 33.4% shot-on-target rate. Our assists are also ranked in the bottom-7 in the league at 32 assists for our 34 goals scored.
We are #17 in the league in goals allowed at 38 between Austin and Miami with 5 of those goals coming from penalty kicks. Those 38 goals came from 133 shots by opponents (middle of the league). We are near the bottom in keeping a clean sheet, tied with Vancouver, Portland, New England, and Chicago with 4 clean sheets on the season. We are middle of the league in saves percentage at 68.8%, but tied for 1st in the league with Dallas and New England in penalty kicks saved with 2.
Thanks for recording all that; it seems to boil down to the fact that we can’t finish, or even get shots on frame all that often.
Agreed. And these are the chances that even resulted in shots. It is probably at least double that for total chances created when we are in or around the box without making a single attempt at a shot.
Thiago Almada leads all of MLS in SCA/90, but left with only 1 assist on the season. Also, AUFC’s Gls/Shot and even xG/shot are very low. I suspect AUFC’s xG is actually a little inflated because of the volume of low percentage shots we take. We have a really high shot total but not much to show for it. Funny thing is we are on the lower end of shot distance. I think we take a lot of shots into a set defense.
If I understand the math correctly, it seems to align with the table standings. Like someone said: we improved with the trades last year but so did all the other teams above us.
That is also how I would interpret it.
A fascinating comparison is to look at how rapidly the valuation of clubs in MLS has grown since our last successful season in 2019. We went from one of the most valuable clubs in the league to one of the least with our relative value on Transfermarkt declining by 24% while 11 clubs in the 2024 season are now valued higher than our 2019 squad. The LA Galaxy grew by 25% over the same time, while also dropping in overall ranking from being the top team above us in 2019 to the second-ranked team behind only Miami in 2024.
The interesting comparison is that in 2019, our xG was 61.8 over 34 matches which would each 1.82 expected goals per match. We scored 55 for an actual 1.62 g/m which is dead on our non-penalty expected goals per match of 54.1.
This season, our 51.14 xG over 24 matches is a higher per match xG than in 2019 at 1.97. Our actual total goals scored per match of 1.31 is significantly lower with 34 goals scored over 26 matches and our year-end project being 44.5 goals (10.5 goals over the remaining 8 matches. If we somehow matched our 2019 goal total of 55 goals, we would need to score at a 2.625 g/m rate to get 21 goals in the remaining 8 matches.
The defense in 2019 allowed 41 goals on a 48.8 opponent xG over 34 matches. We have allowed 38 goals over 26 matches for an opponent xG of 38 or 1.46 xG/90. If our defense allows fewer than 11.68 goals over the remaining 8 matches, that should represent some progress.
I don’t understand why we stopped spending money? Our team valuation has decreased relative to mls And yet we’re still usually right up against the cap? How does that happen
Lots of bad contracts
Agreed. I’ve been impressed by Fortune every time he’s been given the attacking midfielder role. The defense suffered last night when they pulled Dax and shifted fortune back into the defensive role, for Miranchuk’s sub in.
Miranchuk’s debut was not impressive.
tbf…first match, very little training time and the game was kinda coming undone by then.
What were you expecting, given the circumstances (our team is kind of talent deficient and doesn’t have a real coach)? Miranchuk played all of 10 minutes with our current first choice starting attack. Ten minutes after Miranchuk came on, Thiare and Silva made way for Rios and Mosquera (who is barely playable at this level), and they moved Saba to left, IIRC. Then 10 minutes after that, Saba made way for Wolff. That’s a moderate drop-off in striker talent and massive drop-offs in wing play.
Dont’ feel that was a very fair assessment though. The times he had the ball, he looked in control. He just didn’t get it much because LA had possession most of the game. But that shot that went off the cross bar didn’t feel as close as it was and it showed to the goal keeper. That’s something to look forward to when he gets more acclimated.
I didn’t watch the match but to me, Fortune is just OK as a sub and that’s about it.
There have often been positive signs in build up and passing. In fact, the team often looked dangerous early this season. If you recall, they were also often melting down and giving up goals. Yes, there were some scoring doldrums, but the team often had plenty of chances in those games and couldn’t convert. Again, the fact is this team is middling…and very, very far from one of the best rosters in the league…even with a toxic GG and erratic TA. A big part of the breakdown was the belief that Pineda should have had the team near the top of the table, which was kinda silly. And believe it or not, the season will actually get worse, namely wrt the psyche of the team and this will do damage heading into next season. At least Miami continue to look decent.
Who the hell cares about Miami?
Well…glad I did not stay up for this one.
But, seriously, please stop talking about playoffs for this team. The team lacks talent. The only real bright spot from the last few transfers has been Saba. Thiare, Silva, Slisz, even Gregerson have been middling (or worse) all season long to me.
Also, please stop finding “positives” or referring to “improvements.” How long are we going to be improving before we play like a professional team? This isn’t youth rec. We are awful and while some of it is in the players, sure, we are awful because of the way this organization has been led for the past couple years.
The team played “like a professional team” last night. To say otherwise is just dumb.
I feel so bad for the good players we do have that were presumably sold on being foundational players for a competitive team, only to have the rug pulled out from under them.
I can only imagine it gets harder by the day to recruit strong players to the club.
Don’t teams that miss the playoffs still get extra GAM the following season? I’d rather have that than an early playoff loss. It would be one thing if we were set up to make an actual playoff run (you know with more summer signings and a coaching hire), but this team isn’t doing shit if it does find a way into the playoffs.
Im not big on signing 34 year old and older Euro guys, but it doesnt take a rocket surgeon to see that Reus can run laps around Mosquera.
In windows prior to the one that just closed, I’d say we improved but at a slower pace than the competition.
In this window, we’ve clearly taken a big step back, putting tremendous pressure on the winter window that Garth has already said to be a difficult window, generally.
I’m assuming we’ll get the manager sorted, but it feels like we’ve lost so much ground with our talent pool that I think we still need 2 windows to get the roster up to par.
Extremely frustrating, regardless of how you slice it.
Marco Reus isn’t retiring to ATL. Aging Euros will always show a strong preference to play their retirement tour seasons in LA or Miami. There’s no management strategy outside of overpaying players and being tied to them far too long that can counter that simple advantage of geography.
Yeah sure but just because we cant or dont want to sign the Euro pre retirement guys doesnt mean we should have to live in Mosquera’s 8th layer of hell.
Agree Mosquera is awful and TREMENDOUSLY overpaid and (as proven last year) no other club anywhere wants him on his salary.
Hmm…. Let’s see, who brought him in? You see a pattern here?
Wrong. The result went exactly as I expected. A loss by two goals.
Make this season end.