Road Points…? Full Points…? Correct For Atlanta United On Both Counts In Columbus…

It was Columbus, Ohio’s opportunity to check out Gerardo “Tata” Martino’s team as Atlanta United traveled to take on Crew SC.

It took a while, but something happened…

A road win… Yes… Say It With Us… A. Road. Win.

It’s not something your team, as any home side, will attest, you want to be known for but the Crew are now known for helping Atlanta United off that schneide. Crew SC head coach Gregg Berhalter talked about the shut out after the match was over:

"“Well first of all, I think give Atlanta credit for a good performance. They made it difficult for us. We wanted to come out and put a lot of pressure on them and get the crowd into the game, we had a fantastic crowd tonight, get the people behind us and really put pressure on them. They were able to absorb and we weren’t moving the ball quick on enough and unfortunately, we weren’t able to create enough chances.“When you see the shots on goal, it was not good.”"

And the interesting stats to build off what Berhalter admits is: Columbus had the possession numbers (58-42% advantage), the shots advantage (12-8), and more corner kicks (8-3 advantage).

But, remember, what we always say about possession- it’s what you do with it… and Crew didn’t do anything with it…

Here’s your proof:

Looked familiar, didn’t it…? Take you back a couple of weeks…

“Tata” Martino addressed the second version of Villalba and “The Back of the Net…”

"“On the first goal, what he did well was to put himself behind Josef during that long pass, finding the ball and finishing magisterially. On the second goal, he completed the play in the other sector. He controlled the ball with two touches and he was able to convert.”"

The “Peachtree Press” Worked Again…

Berhalter tried to explain the effect that this version of “90 Minutes of Hell” had on his team as Atlanta took the air out of the building and wouldn’t let anyone up on Columbus’ side to create any offense. It will be hard to find any kind of meaningful offensive statistic involving Justin Meram or Ola Kamara from the Saturday match:

"“I don’t think [the high pressure caught us off guard]. Atlanta has two things that they do very well: offensive transition and high pressure. At the time of the first goal, we were actually getting after them and pressuring them and forced them into a long ball. I don’t think it caught us off guard, I just think in general we could have dealt with it better.”"

But, there’s something that happened for the second match in a row… a clean sheet for Alec Kann and the defense… It’s something they take a great deal of pride in- considering the “Peachtree Press’ and the approach have with their styles of play on offense and defense.

The captain, Michael Parkhurst, returned to his old team and was pleased for the whole bunch on their efforts- again:

"“We just had a good mentality. We talked before the game that this was a big one for us. Thestart of the second half of the season on the road and we hadn’t been doing well. We skipped the lines when we needed to, we wanted to play out of the back. We said ‘hey let’s not give away anything, Columbus is too good of a team to gift a goal too.’ It worked out for us, the first goal is as easy as it gets. “They struggled with it a couple of times, we were lucky enough to score. It was just a really good professional performance, we did what we needed to do.”"

Even Kann Got In On The Act…

It’s something to file away going forward for whoever is in net- Kann, Brad Guzan, Kyle Reynish, Alex Tambakis, you, or me…

Let’s go back to what Kann did on the first goal…

And it almost happened again on the second... watch the release...

Playing long and creating issues for the backline... Kann's release and confidence level in distribution have only increased over his time in net for Atlanta United. And it's showing...

""We scored really early and talked about playing a little more direct, not taking as many risks, playing out of the back," Kann said after the match. "Risk vs. reward. Especially early on, we knew they pressed really well in the preseason and did it pretty well in Atlanta. We have to adjust to other teams that we play and I think we did that to perfection today.""

That they did...

Now, on VERY SHORT REST... it's a Tuesday, July 4th match against a very excited San Jose squad that survived another round of the California Clasico.

More on that later in the week...

Okay, Atlanta United fan... WHAT SAY YOU after the big win on the road...?

Can the momentum, stay on a quick turn...?

Check in down in the Comments Section and let us know what you think heading into the match at Bobby Dodd...