ATLUTD at Houston Dynamo Illustrated Box Score: Orange Disaster No. 5

We all saw that, there isn’t much positive that can be drawn from a 4-0 loss when the game is basically out of reach after 30 minutes.

Houston scored against the run of play with Atlanta United just missing going ahead on a couple of chances created close to the Dynamo goal. It seemed like it was all down hill from there with Atlanta’s depth and lineup deficiencies glaringly apparent. It is clear that Jeff Larentowicz is not a good paring with Leandro Gonzalez Pirez, Julian Gressel is not nearly the playmaker at central midfield that Miguel Almiron is - nor is he the compliment to Almiron playing on the wing that Tata wants him to be - and Chris McCann looked like he might have been told to play simple and not make mistakes - taking that to mean he should be completely unnoticeable except for getting a yellow card in the game.

All of this happened just in time for Yamil Asad to saunter back into town next week and say, me extranan?

In short, that game was a mess, sadly unless Tata makes some major adjustments to his approach it may a preview of what’s to come this year rather than an aberration. Here are a few choice stats before we get to the drawings:

• 4 goals allowed: The first time Atlanta United has ever given up four goals in a game and didn’t even get a consolation so it is also the biggest lost in team history
• 0 minutes: The number of minutes that Andrew Carleton played in a game that was completely out of reach
• None: how many goals Houston had in the second half, which is sort of a good sign
• 5 times: the number of games last year that Atlanta was held scoreless in 2017
• 1: The number of goals ANDREW WENGER SCORED - any teams that allows Wenger to score is probably guaranteed to lose

Anyway, here’s another way to look at the stats:

Philippe Senderos may never score a goal as easy as the one he had even when doing header drills in training. Defending set pieces and taking penalties still seems like something the team needs to work on as 2018 wears on.

The best highlights for Atlanta United belonged to Brad Guzan who watched his central midfield get cut to pieces with his center backs on different books, much less different pages, so he is in mid-season yelling at his defenders form. The Five Stripes have a lot to work out and not a lot of time to do it in.

Luckily there’s always next week when Atlanta United gets to face DC United, a team Atlanta has looked to bounce back against three times with no success thus far.

Here’s a quick preview of what to expect next week with DC in town: