12 matches without a win, and then this, against FC Cincinnati. Relief is a strange noise in a football ground and it was the only noise at the end.
Player ratings19 Jun 2028
A brace, and Steven Alzate takes the afternoon — 8.39
There is a particular kind of quiet from an away end watching one man score twice. Steven Alzate provided it, and the 8.39 beside his name is if anything generous to everybody else.
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; Atlanta United FC are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Emmanuel Latte Lath is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
At 22 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
A 2‑0 win over FC Cincinnati, earned rather than given, and the sort of afternoon that sends everyone home talking about next week instead of this one.
Marked 8.13 — the sort of number a correspondent writes down twice to be sure. Everything he tried came off, and what he did not try was not worth trying.
75 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Atlanta United FC lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
Supporters who sing when it goes badly are supporters. Supporters who gather afterwards are a problem, and everybody inside the building knows which of the two this now is.
The offer went to Austin FC this week and it is theirs to answer. First bids are rarely meant to succeed; they are meant to find out how loud the door closes.
A medical, a signature, a shirt held up in front of a sponsor’s board. Atlanta United FC have done the hard part with Philadelphia Union, and the part that remains is the part supporters actually see.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. FC Dallas have kept their man, and Atlanta United FC go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Jorge Landeros is living that version at Atlanta United FC, and it tends to show in the first month.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
“Some mornings you wake up and you are still a long way from everything you know.” It is not the football and it never was; Atlanta United FC are dealing with a man who wants a different country.
The name of Matt Edwards has come up in conversations Atlanta United FC were not part of. Nothing formal, nothing signed — but nothing about it accidental either.
113 days on the estimate, and a long, private, unglamorous year of a rehabilitation nobody watches. Monterrey lose a footballer; he loses considerably more than a season.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Monterrey can pretend not to have heard.
Ninety minutes of very little, and then everything at once. The winner arrived in the 86th, and Queretaro spent what remained of the match appealing to the referee rather than chasing the ball.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Monterrey this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
“The players deserve the credit. My job was easy today.” It was not, and everybody in the room knew it; after 2‑1, Carlos Martin could afford to be generous.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Monterrey, and it is not being withdrawn.
Monterrey have gone to Tijuana with a bid, and the supporters have gone to the internet with an opinion about it. Whether either changes anything is up to the selling club.
Not now, not at any price the club was prepared to say out loud. Club America have kept their man, and Monterrey go back to a list with one name crossed off it.
The number the board signed off was not enough. It has been asked again and raised its own offer to $3.9M — a club that wants Mourad enough to be asked twice.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Monterrey this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
6 call-ups is a compliment to the squad and a headache for the man running it. He will get them back in a fortnight, tired, in various states of repair.