By Canadian Press

Impact hope win over TFC provides blueprint to halt high-flying Atlanta

Sep 22, 2017 | 8:51 PM

MONTREAL — After toppling Toronto, the Montreal Impact have another high-scoring giant in their sights — Atlanta United.

The Impact (11-12-6) head to Mercedes-Benz Stadium on Sunday to face a team that has outscored opponents 17-3 in its first four games in its spanking new facility, including eight goals from Venezuelan sensation Josef Martinez.

Montreal hopes to find the same magic against fourth-place Atlanta (13-8-7) that saw them hand league-leading Toronto FC their first home defeat of the season 5-3 on Wednesday night at BMO Field.

“It’s a similar challenge because it’s a team full of confidence, like Toronto,” coach Mauro Biello said Friday. “A team that’s just plowing through the league.

“Toronto was beating teams 3-0 and 4-0 and it’s the same with these guys. We got a big win against Toronto, which gave us a big boost, and now it’s about repeating that performance. Tight defence, having the matchups right, having the right shape to face them and then hurt them like we hurt Toronto.”

The victory over a Toronto side missing three star players rekindled playoff hopes after the Impact lost four games in a row, including an ugly 3-2 loss at home in their previous outing to the expansion Minnesota United. Seventh-place Montreal sits three points back of the New York Red Bulls, who hold the sixth and final Eastern Conference playoff spot and have a game in hand.

Atlanta is also an expansion team, but it has been a league power from the outset thanks to recruiting that netted South American talent like Martinez, who has 17 goals in only 15 games of an injury-marred campaign, diminutive forward Hector Villalba and playmakers Miguel Almiron and Yamil Asad. Together, they have scored 43 goals in 28 games.

It will be Atlanta’s fifth of a six-game homestand that has seen them win 3-0 over Dallas and 7-0 over New England, tie Orlando 3-3 and win 4-0 Wednesday over the slumping Los Angeles Galaxy.

“We’ll have to watch those guys and try to make sure they don’t get a lot of time on the ball,” said Impact midfielder Samuel Piette. “It’s a similar team to Toronto.

“They like to possess the ball, move it around and wait for their chances, so we’ll have to be very organized defensively and, like in Toronto, try to create chances maybe on the counterattack.”

What Atlanta has yet to do is beat a Canadian-based team, having lost once each in Montreal and Vancouver and tied 2-2 in Toronto. The Impact pulled out a 2-1 win on April 15 when Anthony Jackson-Hamel redirected a Hernan Bernardello shot in stoppage time. Atlanta played most of that game down a man when central defender Leandro Gonzalez Pirez was sent off.

It will be the first visit by a Canadian team to Atlanta, where they lead Major League Soccer with an average of 47,926 spectators per game and drew a league-record 70,425 against Orlando last week. 

Rookie Jackson-Hamel picked up his eighth and ninth goals, in only 17 games, in Toronto while Ignacio Piatti also had a brace to run his total to 17, matching in 24 games his career high set last season in 32 appearances. It was the Impact’s 11th win, equalling their total from 2016 when they finished fifth with only 45 points.

They have 39 points with five games to go and it will likely take at least 48 or 49 to reach the playoffs this season, so losing is no longer an option.

It won’t be easy. The Atlanta game is the second of four in an 11-day stretch that sees second-place New York City visit Saputo Stadium on Wednesday followed by a game at high altitude three days later in Colorado.

“We’ll go to Atlanta and people probably won’t give us a chance there either but the way this league is, and the way we know we can perform, anything’s possible,” said goalkeeper Evan Bush.

On the bright side, the Impact are expected to sign Piatti to a contract extension. Without going into details, the Argentine said he had “good news” on that front that he will announce at the end of the season.

Bill Beacon, The Canadian Press