The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Five Stripes get revenge for defeat in New York
Almiron’s two goals lift team to victory at Bobby Dodd Stadium.
Two goals by Miguel Almiron and another by Hector Villalba led Atlanta United to a 3-1 victory against NYCFC on Sunday at Georgia Tech’s Bobby Dodd Stadium.
Almiron has scored five goals in the past two games to power the Five Stripes (5-4-3) to a second two-game winning streak this season. Atlanta United improved to 3-2 at home and had its fifth consecutive sellout.
Playing without manager Gerardo Martino, who was serving a one-game suspension after being ejected in the second half of last week’s 4-1 home win against Houston, Atlanta United blitzed NYCFC with three goals in the first 23 minutes. The team finished with nine shots, three on goal.
It was the first rematch of the season for Atlanta United, which lost to NYCFC 3-1 at Yankee Stadium less than a month ago. Martino said last week that it was the worst performance his team has had this season.
“The game in New York City was our biggest disappointment of the year,” captain Michael Parkhurst said. “It was our worst performance and we got away from our style of play. We wanted to atone for that and were able to do that.”
Atlanta United will play at Vancouver on Saturday.
Here are five observations from Sunday’s game:
1. Revenge. Atlanta United’s players weren’t quiet this week about wanting to get some revenge against NYCFC after they were beaten 3-1 on a wet, dreary in Yankee Stadium less than a month ago. Several things were different in this meeting: Atlanta United was at home, the field was bigger and therefore better suited for Atlanta United’s tactics, the
team had its fifth consecutive sellout crowd powering it, and it was playing a different lineup than it used in the first meeting, with Villalba replacing Kenwyne Jones at striker and Julian Gressel moving from the middle to the right. Yamil Asad was also back in the lineup as the right midfielder.
“We were able to wake up on the right foot, flip the score on them and get the win, which is important because we’ve been working really hard in practice,” Villalba said.
2. Almiron strikes. After Almiron scored his first hat trick for Atlanta United last week against Houston, NYCFC manager Patrick Vieira elected to man-mark him part of the time with Mikey Lopez in the first half in an attempt to negate his influence.
It didn’t work. Almiron scored the opening goal on a nice pass from Gressel, who was set free down the right on a pass from Villalba. Gressel caught up to the ball just before the end line, and passed it back toward the penalty spot to Almiron. He took one touch, looked up and fired it under goalkeeper Sean Johnson in the 16th minute. It was Almiron’s sixth goal and Gressel’s third assist this season.
3. Second goal. Three minutes later, Villalba made it 2-0. He was set free down the left and curled in a rightfooted shot into the right corner of Johnson’s goal in the 19th minute. Yamil Asad got the assist, his third in two games.
The goal started with nice distribution from goalkeeper Alec Kann, a trait technical director Carlos Bocanegra praised after the game, which led to Asad’s pass that split NYCFC defenders on the right side of their formation.
4. Almiron again. Almiron struck in the 23rd minute with a lot of help from Gressel. The rookie chased down a long pass from Jeff Larentowicz, stole the ball from Alexander Callens while knocking him down, and made the simple pass to Almiron for the tap-in goal. It was Almiron’s sixth goal and Gressel’s fourth assist this season. He has scored two goals in the past three games.
Gressel said he wasn’t sure if the ref blew the whistle for a foul because the crowd was so loud.
“It’s very important that he maintains the level of play he’s been showing the past couple of games,” Almiron said of Gressel.
5. David Villa. After doing what he does in their first game with a goal that came from splitting two defenders, Villa was mostly a nonfactor on Sunday, held in check by Carlos Carmona, Larentowicz, Leandro Gonzalez Pirez and Parkhurst. Villa had two shots, both on target, in the first half. He also had the third-fewest touches (21) on the team. Villa finished with 46 touches and just the two shots.
“Our pressure up front was fantastic,” Parkhurst said. “Miguel, Yamil, Julian, Tito (Villalba) up front were the first line of pressure.”
That pressure reduced the time that NYCFC’s defenders had to look up and find a pass or find Villa running into spaces between defenders.
“I think we put ourselves in a difficult position against the quality players they have on their team,” Vieira said. “Then when you concede a goal in 17 minutes, then 19 minutes and 25 minutes, it is difficult to for us to get something from the game.”