October 28, 2018 MLS Toronto FC--Toronto FC vs Atlanta United (by Rocket Robin)

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Result and details of the Sunday October 28, 2018 MLS game between Toronto FC and Atlanta United played at BMO Field in Toronto at 4:30PM. 8 min...TFC Lucas Janson GOAL...Janson intercepts pass sent to right by defender at 25 yard line and runs forward and shoots 16 yarder from right that deflects off leg of Atl Leandro Gonzalez Pirez at 9 yards and bounces into low left corner of net past goalie Brad Guzan. 20 min...TFC Marky Delgado GOAL...TFC Chris Mavinga receives centering pass at center line and eludes defender and rolls pass forward for TFC Sebastian Giovinco at 33 yard line on left. Giovinco sends short one-touch centering pass that TFC Jonathan Osorio controls midair and volleys back to Giovinco. Giovinco passes between two defenders to Osorio who has run forward to 25 yard line in middle and he finds run blocked by three defenders so turns back and passes right to open Delgado on edge of box. Delgado runs forward to 10 yard line and shoots low 12 yarder from right over sliding defender Chris McCann at 8 yards and diving goalie into low left corner of net. 75 min...TFC Ashtone Morgan at 30 yards on right sideline taps short pass across to TFC Michael Bradley who taps upfield but Atl player intercepts at 35 yards on right and rolls pass forward to Atl Romario Williams. Williams sends short centering pass to Atl Julian Gressel at 25 yards who rolls ball forward to Williams who is splitting defenders Chris Mavinga and Morgan on edge of box. Morgan trips up Williams at 12 yard line on right side of box and referee Jair Marrufo calls a Penalty kick. 75 min...Atlanta Josef Martinez GOAL...Martinez stagger-steps Penalty kick run and rolls ball into left side of net as goalie Alex Bono had dived right. 82 min...TFC Lucas Janson GOAL...TFC Michael Bradley with ball at TFC 35 yard line on right rolls ball forward to TFC Sebastian Giovinco at Atl 50 yard line. Giovinco runs forward along sideline gradually cutting towards middle and on left side of box lets retreating Atl Franco Escobar overrun him and sends roller to right with TFC Marky Delgado at 15 yard line in center of box lets ball rolls past him so wide open Janson can receive it on right and shoot low 10 yarder between legs of sliding Atl Hector Villalba at 8 yards and goalie at 5 yards into left corner of net. 87 min...TFC Sebastian Giovinco GOAL...TFC Jay Chapman receives pass forward at top left corner of box and has low cross from 14 yard line blocked by Atl Michael Parkhurst but ball deflects back to him and he chips cross over to right. Giovinco slides on top right edge of 6 yard box to get to cross and connects with low shot to short side between between goalie and post. Final Score:...Toronto FC.......4.....Atlanta United........1........ Attendance was announced as 23,895 on this cold late afternoon. All eleven MLS games today were started at exactly at 4:30pm with some delays caused for TV purposes for on camera analysis. The starts were to eliminate the strategy of teams playing for ties if other results were uncertain. That didn't fully work out as with an odd number of teams this year, Real Salt Lake had already finished their schedule last week and just watched as results went their way and the Columbus vs Minnesota game was delayed by a lightning storm and Columbus found out they didn't have to win as Montreal had already lost. I arrived early ehough tonight (well among the first 10000 anyway) to receive a free toque from club sponsor KIA Motors. They lost naming rights to TFC's training centre but are still involved with annual hats. They are mostly gray this year which looks good up against my red on black and black on red from previous years' toques. Man of the Match (who is always a TFC player) was announced as Justin Morrow. He had one goal called back after Video Review because a teammate was offside earlier in the play. I expect the awards are decided at about the 80 minute mark so the sponsor can be cued up but that means their decision missed the final two TFC goals. With Lucas Janson scoring the first and then important insurance goal, the choice should obviously have been him. Best non-scoring chances were at 38 minutes when TFC Marky Delgado 28 yard shot from right had TFC Lucas Janson duck and head 15 yarder backwards that goalie jumps to catch just under the bar. 40 minutes had Atl Josef Martinez elude TFC Nick Hagglund and roll a 12 yarder down the middle just wide left of the post. 44 minutes had TFC Jonathan Osorio pass a through ball to TFC Sebastian Giovinco who turned and fired a low 18 yarder that the goalie dove right to save. Injury time had the TFC goalie dive and beat Martinez to the ball that a sliding defender had whiffed on the edge of the box. 57 minutes had TFC Justin Morrow have a goal called back after VAR when TFC Sebastian Giovinco passed to Janson who headed back that Morrow rolled in but the play was offside. 59 minutes had Martinez got to a through ball and the goalie sprawled to save and Martinez whiffed on the rebound. 60 minutes had Giovinco send a 20 yard freekick up the middle wide left. The next minute had Martinez have a 15 yard shot from the left saved by the goalie. Atl Julian Gressel tapped in a 10 yarder into the open net but after VAR the play was ruled offside. 69 minutes had Gressel blast a 10 yard shot from the left off the underside of the bar. 80 minutes had Franco Escobar blasta 25 yard shot that Martinez ducked and headed an 8 yarder wide right of the post. It had been announced earlier that Victor Vazquez and Jozy Altidore would not be in the TFC lineup as they have both had surgeries and are through for the season. Janson was the obvious replacement for Altidore. Our cardboard ticket today was named 'The Viking Clap' which is a cheer routine that only has caught on here in the last year. After the game there were a lot of fans on the field but it was a special 'thank you' from the team of awarding them game worn jerseys earned by those fans catching t-shirts tossed to the crowd at halftime. The players did a post game walk to the south end. It was not worth circling the stadium as a lot of fans had left before the game ended. I noticed on the PA playlist used when TFC wins they played the song 'Hey Ya' by Outkast who are one of the most famous hip-hop groups that ever emerged from Atlanta. It was hard to make out the Atlanta orange names and numbers on their white jerseys. Too see Eric Zavaleta not on the 18 man roster of TFC was a 'win' for many TFC fans who blame his defensive mistakes for many of the team's wows this season. Atlanta's Josef Martinez does win the Golden Boot as his Penalty kick goal was his 31st of the season. He had a few more chances when the result was still in doubt. Zlatan Ibrahimovic was second this year with 22 goals. The all time record was a three way tie with 27 goals shared by three players in 1996, 2012, and 2014. Martinez broke the record back in August and had actually slowed down these last two months. 70 goals for Atlanta is the most in the league this season and is equal to what they scored last year. TFC has the all time record with 74 goals last year. Atlanta outshot TFC 17-10 but a lot were long rangers and TFC had the more important 7-2 shots on target forcing Atlanta goalie Brad Guzan to make good saves. Both sides were called offside four times. Atlanta had to burn one of their subs at 28 minutes because of an injury to defender Chris McCann and one at halftime to shake things up. They made their third at 70 minutes. Atlanta were forced to open up to get a result and TFC eventually scored two late goals to pull away. Referee Jair Marrufo gave out no cards today where easily he could have given some equally to each team. He was involved in two VAR decisions calling back a goal for each team at 57 and 61 minutes. This was the first time (in their four ever games history) that the result was not a 2-2 tie. Atlanta had come into today holding first place and tied for the 'best ever' points total of 69 set last year by TFC. New York Red Bulls beat Orlando City and won the Supporters Shield with 71 points setting a new all time record. They win the Supporters Shield and clinched home field advantage right up to hosting the MLS Cup if they continue to win. Atlanta finishes second in the east and avoid the wild card game and will at least hold semi-final advantage when they play a survivor of that round. Since TFC won it was good enough to hold off Chicago for ninth place. They finish with a record of 10 wins, 18 losses, 6 ties for 36 points. This was quite a come down from last year's first place finish. The TFC lineup had only two Canadian starters--midfielder Jonathan Osorio and defender Ashtone Morgan. They made not subs until 83 minutes when Canadian Jay Chapman replaced Osorio and at 89 minutes when Jason Hernandez replaces Morgan so that meant they finished with only one Canadian! They had a choice of four Canadians on the bench. The use of Canadians is not good enough for me and that's why I'm leaving. I did not renew my season's tickets after not missing attending a home game in their 12 year existance. I expect next year to be following York 9 FC in the new Canadian Premier League which starts next April. One selling point is the subway won't be necessary to get to games. Today to get downtown with the north-south Yonge Street line not running because of scheduled maintenance, I had to take a bus crosstown to get the University line subway. That added an hour each way to my trip. I expect to pick up comparable tickets to where I sit now for about half the price. Rocket Robin robing@eol.ca twitter @RocketRobin01

stats from MLSsoccer.com
Match Information

Goals and Assists
 9'  TOR   Lucas Janson
21'  TOR   Marco Delgado            Assisted By: Jonathan Osorio
77'  ATL   Josef Martínez (PK)
83'  TOR   Lucas Janson             Assisted By: Sebastian Giovinco, Michael Bradley
88'  TOR   Sebastian Giovinco       Assisted By: Jay Chapman

Disciplinary      None

Lineup

Toronto FC
16 F Lucas Janson
10 F Sebastian Giovinco
 2 F Justin Morrow
25 G Alexander Bono
 9 D Gregory van der Wiel
 6 D Nick Hagglund
23 D Chris Mavinga
 5 D Ashtone Morgan          (90'+1)   
18 M Marco Delgado
 4 M Michael Bradley
21 M Jonathan Osorio         (84')

Bench
 1 G Clint Irwin
12 D Jason Hernandez         (90'+1')
14 M Jay Chapman             (84')
27 M Liam Fraser
22 F Jordan Hamilton
11 F Jon Bakero
54   Ryan Telfer

Manager  Greg Vanney

Lineup

Atlanta United FC
24 F Julian Gressel
 7 F Josef Martínez
 8 F Ezequiel Barco            (70')
 1 G Brad Guzan
 2 D Franco Escobar
 3 D Michael Parkhurst
 5 D Leandro González Pirez
16 D Chris McCann              (28')
 6 M Darlington Nagbe
18 M Jeff Larentowicz          (HT)
11 M Eric Remedi

Bench
25 G Alec Kann
 4 D Greg Garza                 (28')
12 D Miles Robinson
32 M Kevin Kratz
15 M Héctor Villalba            (HT) 
28 M Andrew Wheeler-Omiunu
 9 F Romario Williams           (70')

Manager  Gerardo Martino

Officials
Referee                     Jair Marrufo
Assistant Referee           Adam Garner
Assistant Referee           Jeffrey Greeson
Fourth Official             Alejandro Mariscal
Video Assistant Referee     Geoff Gamble

Match Information
MLS at BMO Field
Toronto, ON
Attendance 23895
Weather Cloudy

Team Statistics

TFC                              ATL  
 10    Shots                      17      
  7    Shots on Target             2      
  3    Shots off Target           13       
  0    Blocked Shots               2      
  1    Corners                     3         
  4    Crosses                    22     
  4    Offsides                    4        
 10    Fouls                      11        
  0    Yellow Cards                0        
  0    Red Cards                   0       
414    Total Passes              536        
 73 %  Passing Accuracy           80 %       
 43.1 % Possession                56.9 %        
 43    Duels Won                  43        
  6    Tackles Won                12         
  1    Saves                       3       
 19    Clearances                  6

Toronto FC starters