It was a challenging back-and-forth against Charlotte FC on Sunday, but one of the clearest standouts for Atlanta United came in the form of midfielder Thiago Almada. The 20-year-old from Argentina put on a strong performance in the 1-0 loss to Charlotte.
Although he didn’t wind up on the score sheet, Almada’s role was setting up his teammates. He created opportunities at a high rate and finished the match with six key passes, jumping his season total to 10 after just four career MLS appearances.
Atlanta United failed to score on Sunday, but the team had chances – which is what the team wants to do and how they define their identity. Atlanta finished with 1.34 expected goals, which was more than the home team (0.90).
“You look at the players that we have on the field, we want to attack, we want to be on the front foot, create chances, score goals,” goalkeeper Brad Guzan said.
Almada was a big part of that on Sunday. He led the team far and away with chances created (6) and number of completed passes (49). Joining up with midfielder Marcelino Moreno, striker Dom Dwyer and left fullback Andrew Gutman, the team had a season-high 16 shots.
“Happy with some parts of our game, I think once we started to find Thiago and Marcelino with areas, we are creative and we start to have something in behind,” head coach Gonzalo Pineda said. “But obviously, that’s something we need to improve making runs in behind and trying to stretch the backline.”
Almada combined well with teammates, especially Gutman. The two established a good repertoire in preseason during the team’s trip to Mexico and were involved in one of Atlanta’s best scoring opportunities in the 33rd minute. The moment led to a Moreno shot that required a diving save from Charlotte goalkeeper Kristijan Kahlina.
Almada and Moreno bring different strengths to Atlanta United’s attack. While Moreno likes the dribble, Almada is more of a connector. Against Charlotte, Moreno led the team in dribbles completed (4). Meanwhile, Almada completed more passes in the final third (17) than any other player on the pitch.
“I think it’s a very good balance there,” Pineda said.
Those different aspects made Atlanta United’s attack more dynamic and led to more chances when it was successful. Together, Moreno and Almada combined for seven of Atlanta United’s 16 shots and had four of the team’s six shots on target.
“I think with Thiago you can see a little bit of that creativity that he has on the ball, and when he starts to connect with Marcelino, they just move the ball faster on the field,” Pineda said.
Almada is one of three designated players on Atlanta’s roster. Since arriving to Atlanta at the beginning of March, he’s steadily gotten more involved in the attack. In that time span, he’s gone from a second-half sub to starting and playing a full 90. In his second appearance, he scored the goal that set in motion Atlanta’s late comeback to draw CF Montréal 3-3.
Each match, Almada has had more touches and completed more passes than the match before. Although, injuries have prevented all four members (Almada, Moreno, Josef Martínez, Luiz Araújo) of Atlanta United’s line of attack from seeing the pitch at the same time, Almada is on a promising trajectory for the 5-Stripes.
