The good bits of news for Atlanta United following its 3-1 loss at Vancouver on Saturday are that it no longer has to travel to the West Coast for the rest of the regular season, and it likely won’t face another player as big as the Whitecaps Kendall Waston, who had a hand in all three goals.
The bad news for the Five Stripes is it must play a Chicago team that is much, much better than the one they defeated 4-0 in the season’s third game. Oh, and Chicago will likely be highly motivated because of that loss. Oh, and the team has added Bastian Schweinsteiger, only one of the best players in Germany’s famed history. Oh, and the team has a four-game winning streak heading into its game on Sunday at Orlando. Oh, and Vancouver showed how to negate some of Miguel Almiron’s influence. Oh, and … never mind.
“They’re a confident group and Schweinsteiger has brought that with him and it’ll be a tough intra-conference battle,” Atlanta United captain Michael Parkhurst said. “But we’ll be ready for it.”
Being ready will likely involve even more work in training this week on defending set pieces. Atlanta United has allowed 20 goals this season, including four from indirect kicks.
Despite watching at least 15 videos and focusing on set pieces last week in anticipation of playing Vancouver, the Whitecaps scored two goals directly off corner kicks and a third indirectly after a second ball wasn’t won and the defense became disorganized.
Waston, a 6-foot-5, 195-pound centerhalf, had a hand in all three goals. He scored the first in the 31st minute when Parkhurst said Atlanta United’s defense failed to stay organized as it started to move up the field following a corner kick.
Waston scored the second on a header in the 44th minute. Atlanta United’s Leandro Gonzalez Pirez seemed to be watching the incoming cross, rather than making sure to jump with Waston. Those were Waston’s first goals this season.
“Waston is a beast in the air on the headers, we try to have a guy in the zone marking him but he’s very good,” Parkhurst said. “Obviously, we paid the price. We gave up too many set pieces to him, too many corners, too many opportunities to them. We knew that was a strength for them and a weakness for us and we got punished today.”
And Waston’s header on another corner led to Fredy Montero’s goal in the 68th minute.
“There aren’t many players like Waston in the league,” Atlanta United manager Gerardo Martino said. “Waston is a player that causes problems for a lot of teams, not just Atlanta.”
The other thing Atlanta United must solve is to how to get Almiron involved, or take advantage, when the opponent is focusing as many as three players on him. In Vancouver’s 4-1-4-1 set up, Martino said Almiron was typically surrounded by three players, at least one of which was paying attention to him.
Almiron still finished with 69 touches and completed 56 passes, but he had just one shot on target after scoring five goals the previous two games.
“We didn’t do a good enough job of getting him in the game,” Parkhurst said. “That being said, he almost scored a goal in the second half on a good chance. For us in the back it was difficult for us to get him the ball from the back line because of the dry turf. We need to do a better job of getting him and the rest of offensive guys in good spots.”
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