Pre-game Atlanta United return home after a very good away win in Montreal. They leave Canada to come home and host the most famous Canadian club. The defending MLS Cup champions, Toronto FC, have had a nightmare of a season so far, but as luck would have it, are finding their form and health right as they face Atlanta. The record-breaking team of 2017 has struggled mightily and currently sit next to bottom on 22 points through 21 matches played. Jozy Altidore is back from a long spell on the sidelines and with him the the goals have returned. Meanwhile, the Five Stripes are looking better after a sputter in form. The addition of Eric Remedi offered a noticeable difference to the midfield in the win over the Impact. His partnership with Jeff Larentowicz allowed Atlanta to control the midfield despite being away from home. Tata Martino has plenty of lineup headaches coming into this one with Ezequiel Barco still benched, Franco Escobar suspended due to yellow card accumulation, and both Sal Zizzo and Mikey Ambrose out with injuries. 16-year-old Homegrown Player George Bello is training with the first-team and could be forced into the matchday squad out of necessity. Can Atlanta topple Toronto and extend the defending champs’ woes? Or will the Reds’ miracle push for the playoffs begin at the expense of United? Let’s find out. Note: We’re trying something new with our match threads this year. We’ll be updating the post with updates of goals and big moments as they happen. Check back every so often during the match for highlights and commentary. Atlanta United’s Lineup: Toronto FC’s Lineup: How to Watch Venue: Mercedes-Benz Stadium Advertised Kickoff Time: 4:00 p.m. ET Available TV: ESPN, ESPN Deportes Available Streaming: WATCHESPN Available Radio: 92.9 The Game (English), AT&T Countdown to Kickoff (FB Live/Periscope), La Mejor 1600 AM (Spanish) This thread will be your match thread. We don’t have many rules here. We just ask that you don’t insult each other personally and treat each other with respect. Debates can get heated and that’s fine, but name-calling and petty insults will get you banned. If you see a comment that you feel is out of line, please report it and it will be dealt with.<doc-sep>Atlanta United is coming off of a disappointing performance in the MLS All Star game as it lost in penalties to Juventus. Inevitable. Worse still, fans didn’t get to see Zlatan and Josef Martinez team up for double hat tricks because, despite being a god or a lion or shameless self-promoter, the Swedish legend decided to rest up after logging a lot of minutes while still recovering from serious knee surgery. Anyway, onto the Prekrap... Like maple syrup, Canada’s evil oozes over the United States Canada, what with their passive aggressive smugness masked as humility as they do things like give their citizens healthcare and win MLS Cup will send their best soccer team to Atlanta this weekend. Toronto FC is the best team in MLS history to ever earn 69 points in a season to then turn around and have the best ever showing in the Concacaf Champions League when they lost to the 17th place team from the LigaMX Clausura and then have six wins through 21 games. Despite being terrible through most of the 2018 season Toronto is coming around, and by coming around I mean they got to play the somehow worse Chicago Fire in back to back games because MLS is a good league and schedules games like that. Those wins have TFC six points out of the MLS playoffs and in a position to perhaps make an unlikely playoff run. Though they will have to answer a very pertinent question: are they good actually or did they beat a weirdly assembled team with a world class midfielder, a bunch of draft picks and underperforming homegrown players on it? Standing in their way is Atlanta United, a team they did not manage to beat in their historic season when they were the best squad in MLS history. It seems unlikely that Toronto will try to play Atlanta United in an open game. Not a lot of teams have had success doing that so far this year against the Five Stripes, meaning when Atlanta goes on the road teams come at them and get trounced in transition, so expect some version of public transportation soccer out of the visitors this weekend. Toronto has struggled for much of this year thanks to injuries. Against the Chicago Fire, who played right back Brandon Vincent as a center back for some reason, the team had their strongest lineup and the result was a dominant 3-0 victory. The lineup featured Jozy “BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO” Altidore at striker, he scored a goal even, alongside Sebastian Giovinco in a 3-5-2 with Michael “BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO” Bradley back in his regular no. 6 role. Bradley spent some of the year playing center back and his patented - close down an attacker but don’t really do much to challenge the ball - defending has helped Toronto give up 39 goals this year. Basically, expect Toronto to try to clog up the midfield, cede possession to Atlanta and then try to work the counter with Altidore making runs to draw defenders away from Giovinco as Jonathan Osorio, Vincent Vazquez, and Bradley try to play him through Atlanta’s defense. It might work for the visitors, despite being very bad this year they have actually managed to score more goals as a team than Josef Martinez has by himself this year. Atlanta United - looking for success against 10th place teams Since losing to the NY Red Bulls on May 20, Atlanta United has amassed a 6-4-1 record with the only loss coming on the road to FC Dallas in a game we will never speak of again. Most teams would gladly take 22 points out of 11 games, but two of those draws - to Seattle and Portland at home - are probably not sitting well with the team. Still, Atlanta has 47 points through 23 games and is on pace to have a 69 point season - hi Toronto. There is a lot of work to be done and Atlanta United will need to beat teams it is better than in order to win the Supporter’s Shield. As it stands now, Atlanta is leading in the points race and while NYCFC, FC Dallas, and NY Red Bulls have games in hand, that isn’t the same as points on the table, especially as two of those teams adjust to their new coaches. In short, Atlanta controls its destiny and the result Saturday will go a long way in determining its fate with a stretch of five of the next seven matches away after this weekend. As far as how Atlanta will try to beat Toronto, Tata Martino will have to rely on his defensive depth as it seems like Michael Parkhurst, Leandro Gonzalez-Pirez, and Miles Robinson are the only natural defenders who will be available with Sal Zizzo, Franco Escobar, and Mikey Ambrose all out. Where’s Anton Walkes these days? Wherever he is, he might end up watching Atlanta play in a three center back formation. Should the team go that route, Julian Gressel will be back to his role at the beginning of the season sending cutbacks in toward goal and Chris McCann will be on the other side of the pitch trying to slow down Giovinco and Altidore. On the other hand, perhaps Gressel starts as an out and out right back with Robinson on the bench - I’m tempted so say this will absolutely not happen, but know that if I do it inevitably will. However the team lines up they will again face the challenge of most likely needing to turn their possession into chances in the highly random world of trying to score against teams that park the bus and they will have to do it against a team that is either rounding into form or just managed to get some good results against an increasingly awful looking Chicago Fire team. Let’s play a game Everyone really enjoyed it when I did this last week so maybe I’ll make it a thing. By beating Toronto FC, Atlanta United will have taken all possible points against Canadian opposition this season so far - if they win Saturday and again in October and sweep Toronto this year they will be awarded the Voyageurs Cup: True or False? Will it even matter when this game seems destined to end in a 2-2 draw?<doc-sep>
A: It's impossible to look past Toronto's extensive injury list in diagnosing what has gone wrong this season. Greg Vanney has designed the way this team plays around its glittering cast of stars, and when those stars aren't available there are things that just don't work as intended. Drew Moor, Chris Mavinga, Justin Morrow, Jozy Altidore and Victor Vazquez — all of whom would have a shot at an All-Star nod in full, healthy seasons — have spent significant periods of time in the medical room. The situation is improving because the team is getting healthy — Moor is the only player who will not be ready to play in Atlanta. Mavinga has made a huge difference at the back, and Sebastian Giovinco has been rejuvenated by the return of Altidore alongside him. Q: Atlanta United supporters may laugh at this question because they know that I’m not the biggest appreciator of Michael Bradley. Sell me on his value to Toronto this season and his potential impact on Saturday’s game. A: Bradley needs a solid structure around him — runners in midfield, playmakers to pass to and a communicative defensive unit. When he has those things, he can run games from his deep-lying midfield position like no one else in MLS. He can find teammates long and short, he breaks up play and he reads and contains counter-attacks very well. He's also been an incredible big-game performer for Toronto and was probably the best player on the field in each of the past two MLS Cup finals. When that structure isn't there, Bradley struggles. He seems to lose faith in what is going on around him and starts overcompensating and making poor decisions. We've seen that when the likes of Moor, Mavinga and Vazquez have been injured, and it was apparent when he was given virtually no midfield support by Bruce Arena last year. I also wonder if his relentless, every-day intensity — which has been essential in turning around the previously rotten culture in Toronto — might rub people up the wrong way when results aren't good. But he has given everything he has to TFC and it's hard to argue there has been a more influential figure in the transformation of the club. Q: What is the matchup to watch and how do you think it will go? A: I was going to say Mavinga against Josef Martinez, but I think attempting to contain a striker of his quality is an exercise in futility. Toronto will have to cut off the supply instead, and that means controlling the midfield. I expect Vanney to stick with the 4-3-1-2 formation he switched to against Chicago and with Bradley, Marky Delgado, Jonathan Osorio and Vazquez all available, that's the one area of the field in which I think TFC still has the upper hand over Atlanta. That will need to be apparent if the Reds are going to get anything from this game. Q: Will Toronto make the playoffs this season? A: Toronto hasn't looked like a playoff team for most of the year. But we know from the wider context of the past couple of seasons, as well as the CONCACAF Champions League run, that closing a six-point gap is far from beyond this side when its best players are available. It will, again, come back to health: if Vanney can keep something close to his best 11 on the field for the final 13 games, I think they'll squeak in. If he can't, they won't.