Atlanta United is in a preseason matchweek. The team begins their six-game preseason slate this Saturday with a visit north to Chattanooga FC on January 25.
Saturday will not only be the first competitive scrimmage for the team in 2025. It will also be a first and early look at the club’s new leader on the sideline, head coach Ronny Deila.
It's been just one month since Deila was announced the head coach of Atlanta United. Now, the Norwegian manager is busy at work with the team just one month shy from the regular season home opener against CF Montréal.
The concepts Ronny Deila is implementing
We know that Deila wants Atlanta United to play fast, attacking-style football, and those concepts have been part of the first sessions of preseason. Deila has been coaching his players to be aggressive, be daring and play together as a team.
While those ideas can easily be attributed to offense, they can also apply to the defensive side as well. Being organized will help Atlanta United be prepared to win the ball back and keep possession. Being aggressive will help the team win balls in the center of the pitch.
And, of course, there’s a general approach that Deila encourages in his practices, which involves the word intensity. He wants his group, even this early in the year, to bring a desire to win to each and every training session -- no matter if it's indoor, outdoor or in the gym.
"You have to go into every training as if it’s a Cup final and care about losing and winning, because that creates intensity and the competitiveness. You don't win anything if you don't have those two things," he said.
The most effective way Deila is planning to implement his concepts is communication. He’s a big believer in simplifying the message. Young men need clear lines and sometimes need to hear the same things over and over again for them to sink in. So, Deila’s messages will be simple and clear… and repetitive.
"I think they're going to get tired of the same messages," Deila said. "I'd rather them be tired of my voice and saying the same things than going to be new things all the time."
How the team and new head coach are getting to know each other
The team’s eagerness and reception to Deila’s concepts has been very good, even in the harsh weather brought to Atlanta this week.
The colder temperatures, which have dipped into the teens, moved Atlanta United for a few days. They spent the early part of the week in Flowery Branch, a city in Hall County, that is home to the Atlanta Falcons training center. The Falcons' indoor facility has given some reprieve, at least for a few days, to the harsh outdoors this week.
Apart from hitting the pitch, Deila and his coaching staff have gone back and looked through video and stats from every Atlanta United game from last year. This has given them valuable insight into each player and how they can work together to improve.
This is all part of the process of everyone getting to know each other better, which is important, especially with a new head coach. Part of that has been made easy because not everyone on the coaching staff is new. Deila has retained two assistants from last season, Matt Lawrey and Carl Robinson, to join new assistant coach Kenny Miller and goalkeeper coach Elliot Parish.
Lawrey, who has been with the club since 2016, and Robinson bring a lot of knowledge about opponents, about the culture and the city, about the players themselves, and Deila said it wouldn't be smart to not use their experience and information.
"I don't want to be a group inside the group," Deila said. "I want to be part of Atlanta United and the staff there."
Five (plus one) preseason matches
January 25 is the first of six preseason matches for Atlanta United. The first two games at Chattanooga and Birmingham will be open to the public and available to live stream at atlutd.com/live.Then, the team departs to Florida, where they also spent part of preseason in 2024.
Following matches against Chattanooga FC and Birmingham Legion, Atlanta will play preseason friendlies against four MLS teams. The sixth and final match was confirmed just this week against Orlando City SC.
"This is a whole new moon as a coach," Deila said.
These matches will give first impressions of how the team is coming together in a full 11v11 competition. It will test the team's fitness and show Deila what he has tactically at his disposal:
“The first 2-3 weeks everything you do is fantastic, but then we get to know each other like a normal relationship," he said. "The ups and downs will come, and then we will really know each other. And the games give all the answers of what you have done and what we need to work on."
Countdown to February 22, 2025
If you don’t have the date February 22 circled, you might want to go ahead and make sure you don't have any plans that day.
That is when Atlanta United’s regular season will begin. And for the first time since 2023, Atlanta United is kicking its season off at home at Mercedes-Benz Stadium.
The goal for Atlanta United in 2025 is to improve where they left off the year prior. The team finished ninth in the Eastern Conference standings. Then, they made an improbable run in the Audi 2024 MLS Cup Playoffs that gave a glance of what the team is capable of.
If the team improves, the team will get better results, Deila said, which means a chance to climb up the standings and reserve one of those coveted top-four spots in the conference.
"We do all these things because we want to achieve something special," Deila said. "To win is special. That's something you'll remember for the rest of your life."
Lifting the MLS Cup is another target for Atlanta United, which Saba Lobjanidze and Mateusz Klich shared last week. While Deila said Tuesday it could take an extra year or two to get there, he also isn’t being patient when it comes to winning:
"There's nothing better if you do it in the first year."
