Atlanta United have made some strides under interim coach Rob Valentino, going unbeaten at 1-0-2 in his three matches.
The Five Stripes (5-8-6, 21 points) will look to continue that form when they play host to Toronto FC (7-10-3, 24 points) on Saturday night.
Atlanta conceded an 89th-minute goal in a 2-2 draw with Houston in Valentino’s debut June 15 at home. The Five Stripes won 1-0 at D.C. United before a 1-1 tie at St. Louis City last weekend.
“It was a good couple results in terms of points at difficult places, difficult conditions to go into, and to find a way to get three points and then battle back and get a draw,” goalkeeper Brad Guzan said. “Now we need to up it even more and make sure it comes out that we are able to get three points.”
Atlanta is surprisingly winless in seven matches (0-5-2) at home since a 3-0 victory against Chicago on March 31.
“I mean, it’s a bit of a mentality thing, like when we go on the road, we know it’s going to be a fight, it’s going to be the other team might have the ball at times,” defender Noah Cobb said.
“And I think at (home), like, we always want to dominate, dominate, dominate. At times, if there’s a spell in the game where the other team has the ball, we might get a little discouraged. I think it’s just applying that same mentality that we have on the road to the home games.”
Toronto FC have lost three league matches in a row and are winless in six (0-4-2) since a 5-1 victory against Montreal on May 18.
A similar slump last year dropped them to the bottom of the league standings by the end of the season.
“Maybe the scars starting to open up from previous seasons,” said Toronto coach John Herdman, whose team lost 3-0 to the host New York Red Bulls last Saturday. “(The coaching staff has been) reminding them that we’re not that team. We’re a team that’s sitting in the playoffs. We’re a team that has got first results, at different venues in our history and gotten clean sheets in rows.
“It’s deep trauma, you know, which is linked to the shaming moments of last year. When you’re used to connecting those things back together when there’s a bad result, or a tough moment, those emotions come back pretty quickly.”
Toronto holds a 5-4-6 edge in regular-season meetings between the teams but has never won in Atlanta, going 0-3-4. Toronto defeated host Atlanta 2-1 in the 2019 Eastern Conference final.
–Field Level Media
