Since Stephen Glass took over as interim head coach of Atlanta United, much of the talk has been about getting Atlanta back to their core values and style.
That means winning with energetic, entertaining and attacking soccer.
In Glass' interim reign the club are finding their feet again, all without Josef Martinez, of course. The process won't be linear nor easy, as Atlanta picked up a 2-0 win over Nashville SC but lost 3-1 to rival Orlando City SC this weekend. With a clash against struggling Inter Miami on Wednesday (7 pm ET | FS1 in US; MLS LIVE on DAZN in Canada), Glass forecasts his side to be the aggressors.
“(Miami) have multiple threats, wide and through the middle, and we need to be on our guard," Glass told reporters on a virtual press conference Monday. "But any game where we’re at home with the players that we’ve got, we should be looking to take charge of the game.”
Even without Josef, Atlanta still boast the likes of Pity Martinez, Ezequiel Barco, Matheus Rossetto and new signings Jurgen Damm and Cubo Torres. Pity scored both goals in Atlanta's win over Nashville, while Rossetto continues to find his feet.
“We have a lot of players in the top half of the pitch that are good with the ball at their feet," Glass said. "Having that belief, putting that belief in the group, I think you’ll see it. It’s a positive group.”
But Pity and Rossetto are the only two of the group are the only ones fully fit at the moment.
Barco is returning from injury while Damm and Torres are working on match fitness/sharpness after their summer moves to Atlanta. Getting up to speed on the fly, without friendlies to get match minutes in your legs, isn't easy. Barco played 30 minutes off the bench while Damm made his Atlanta debut with 11 minutes against Orlando. Both players picked up assists on Atlanta's lone goal. Torres has played a total of 40 minutes over two games.
Glass expects more involvement for those three players against Miami.
“The aim is they’ll get a little bit more (time against Miami)," Glass said. "The aim is they’ll keep building. You saw the quality of these boys when they got on the pitch. We haven’t had a group of preseason game where you can afford to give guys 35 minutes or half a game because the results are important. But the results over the course of the season is more important than one individual result. We have to get this group of players as good as they can be for what hopefully will be a very important run in.”
