Carlos Bocanegra's post-secondary transfer window quotes: Annotated

Atlanta United technical director Carlos Bocanegra spoke to media yesterday following the completion of the secondary transfer window. I didn’t make it because, apparently, cars need brakes to drive (??).

But the media with working vehicles were kind enough to ask a couple of questions for me and pass along the audio from the press conference. 

Like we did at the start of the window, let’s go through the key quotes and see what we can learn about the club's future. There are still plenty of unknowns. But this time, we at least know which players will be involved, at least for the last 10 games. 

Atlanta raids Ligue 2

Atlanta United signed three players this window from teams who competed in Ligue 2 last year. Tristan Muyumba played for EA Guingamp, Xande Silva is on loan from Dijon AFC, and Jamal Thiaré played for Le Havre. It seems clear that Atlanta sees Ligue 2 as a league where they can find value. However, it doesn’t seem that there is a mandate to solely look at players from the French second division.

“It ended up being a coincidence," Bocanegra said. "Sometimes this is how it works. We looked at a lot of different leagues and we looked at a lot of players this window. You try to be opportunistic with your signings and you try to hit value. We feel that that league is pretty darn athletic and translates well here." 

It worked out nicely for the team to be able to bring in Muyumba while capitalizing on changing financial situations for Le Havre and Dijon. Le Havre were promoted to Ligue 1 and unlikely to bring back a rotation player from their Ligue 2 side like Thiaré. He went out of contract and Atlanta brought him in. Dijon were relegated and that undoubtedly changed things for a starting-caliber player like Silva. They found a situation that worked for everyone while recovering a bit of lost cash. 

Right now, those two moves feel shrewd on Atlanta’s part. At the very least, they’re low risk. And if they work out the way it appears the Muyumba moves is set to work out, you can expect them to go back to the Ligue 2 well in the future. 

Notably, new DP winger Saba Lobjanidze (Sah-bah Lobe-jah-neat-zey) also comes from a team in a changing financial situation. Hatayspor did not finish the 2022-23 season after an earthquake forced the club to suspend operations in February. It’s unclear how intentional it is, but it does seem like Atlanta found opportunities to bring in players at costs that were potentially reduced. 

Atlanta’s changing attack (and formation?)

While the moves themselves seem shrewd, it is curious that Atlanta United made one move to fix the midfield and several moves to improve an attack that already ranked among the best in the league while the Five Stripes are among the league’s worst defenses (for a number of reasons).

“It was more about giving the team the balance. Tristan, although he did quite well getting in the opposition's box last game, that's not necessarily his number one strength to help solidify the middle is his ball-winning ability. I think you saw a few plays that he broke up. But that allows Brooks and Caleb with Miles back and Abram in the mix along with Purata to succeed. So it was more signing, the wingers who'd be able to get us balance,” Bocanegra said. 

The idea of balance here is interesting. My gut here is that there’s some truth to that concept as the thrust behind Atlanta’s moves this window. But I also have a sense that the uncertainty with the personnel at the back and in midfield for next season played a big role in Atlanta’s decisions. Miles Robinson is out of contract and Juanjo Purata’s loan is ending. Matheus Rossetto is out of contract and the Five Stripes seem likely to try and move on from one or both of their U22 midfielders, Santiago Sosa and Franco Ibarra, as they move towards having one U22 instead of four. 

With the team set to clear space and the futures of players like Robinson (who still has a max TAM contract on the table) unclear, it makes some sense to hold off on moves at those positions until there’s a little more clarity. Compare that to Atlanta’s situation on the wing where Luiz Araujo’s departure left an obvious hole, Caleb Wiley is moving back to left back and Derrick Etienne Jr.’s lack of end product so far has resulted in his minutes being reduced. Atlanta largely opted to fill the clearest gaps even if there are still critical gaps to address in the long term. 

You might balk at that, but the team has been transparent as of late that they’re in the midst of a multi-window process. 

“A hard part about this that's been harder than I thought maybe coming in is that we had a lot of contracts that needed to get cleaned up,” Atlanta United President Garth Lagerwey told 92.9 The Game’s Dukes and Bell show yesterday. “Josef Martinez is probably the most visible one at the end of the year. But Alan Franco and Marcelino Moreno and Luiz Araujo, we've had to dig out from some stuff. So the good news is we're making progress. I think we've got one more difficult transfer window where we're going to have to do a lot of work. But hopefully after that, after next winter, we will be all set in terms of full speed ahead in terms of where we want to go going forward.”

It’s likely major tweaks to the spine of the team in midfield and at (potentially) center back and maybe even goalkeeper are on the way still. For the short-term future, though, Atlanta will be looking to a more “balanced” attack to steady the team as a whole. Considering Gonzalo Pineda’s game model is centered around defending via possession, it’s not a bad bet to make. Having Muyumba in the middle of the field winning the ball back and progressing it into the final third will make everyone better. A more effective presence on the wing with players like Lobjanidze, Silva and Etienne, who are focused on receiving the ball in behind, should improve the attack as a whole. And swapping Wiley for Andrew Gutman at left back should add slightly more stability at the back. 

Does that mean the team is drastically improved? I don’t think so. At least not yet. But it’s not hard to imagine the group looking sharper over the final 10 games of the year.

It’s also easy to imagine the team reverting back to a 4-3-3 over those 10 games. The wingers they’ve brought in and the discussion from Bocanegra and other about Wiley moving back to left back seem to indicate that shift is coming. In general, this seems to be the ideal setup for Pineda’s game model. The 3-4-2-1 always felt more like a way to cover up personnel deficiencies rather than dominate a game the way Pineda and the club want to. 

What the new wingers might bring

As a DP, Lobjanidze is a locked-in starter going forward. Silva may potentially take on a starting role as well while Thiaré will act as a backup option at striker. Yesterday, Bocanegra offered some insight on how the club expects them to play.

Xande comes inside a lot. If he's gonna play off the left, he comes inside and can combine off his right foot. So we have that ability to stretch the other team vertically. Thiago is fantastic at finding those passes. GG comes back, does a good job holding up the ball. Saba and Xande both like to run, Edwin (Mosquera) and Derrick both like to run too,” Bocanegra said.

“Saba will come inside and combine. He likes to run behind. He's energetic. We compared him kind of like the Paul Arriola/Tito Villalba type profile. That’s not a player-to-player comparison but just more that profile of player that is constantly running and constantly on the move. 

“Jamal's a great forward. He's happy to bang and get dirty and run the channels and chase lost causes. He presses in a similar profile to GG where they hustle and they're not afraid to mix it up. And so we feel like, again, we're adding some pieces that can really energize the team and give us more.”

Again, making the attack more vertical seems to be the key here. Atlanta wants wingers that get to the end line and can cut the ball back to create for Giorgos Giakoumakis and late-arriving runners like Almada and Muyumba. 

Which, hey, speaking of Almada…

They’re going to keep Almada as long as they can

Just a reminder that they’re in no rush to move Almada. As long as Almada wants to be here, he’ll be here. The team has routinely stated they’re in no hurry to move him along and that Arthur Blank is more concerned with trophies than transfer fees. Feel free to take that at face value or dismiss it but it does seem like they’re walking the walk here. By bringing in a DP like Lobjanidze that they can remove the DP tag from, they’re showing that they’re making a bet on Thiago Almada being around long enough to age out of his current Young DP tag.  

Lagerwey went a bit more in-depth on that in the Dukes and Bell interview we talked about earlier and I would encourage folks to go listen to that.

A few more notes and quotes

The timeline for visas and paperwork for the new folks seems to be about two weeks. You can probably be optimistic but not assured that they’ll be available for Seattle.

Bocanegra spent the last part of his press conference advocating for the league’s internal transfer market to be retooled. For now, teams must spend allocation money to trade for players. Bocanegra argued for intra-MLS transfers to be like any other transfer where teams send cash to another team in exchange for a player. 

“We have a lot of rules and regulations in the league, but the internal transfer market, I really hope the league takes a hard look at that. Let's take a guy like Diego Rossi when he was getting ready to leave LAFC. Maybe that's someone we would have bought from LAFC back then. And maybe they get a million more than they get from the Turkish clubs. That's nuanced but at least you set a floor for all the players if you have an internal transfer market. Which is good for the ownership, which is good for the fan base, because they get more involved. They're excited. You know, it drives a lot more news,” Bocanegra said.

“Tiito Villalba was a great example for us when you know, we were coming. I think it was 2019 we had kind of pushed the limits on the cap and we had to move a few of the guys you know multiple clubs in the league offered good money for him. But you just can't dish out a million and a half GAM for every player right? So if they could spend you know a million and a half, two million he would have stayed in the league. That is something I really hope that the league in general can push forward because that is a fantastic opportunity that I think we're missing right now is an internal transfer market that doesn't have to do with the GAM and TAM that you can actually buy a player from another club, and good players stay within this league.”

Bocanegra also discussed the team’s recruiting efforts for new players. Maybe it’s because practice just started, but it feels a little college football, doesn’t it?

“I think this organization has done a fantastic job of given the resources not only on the field, but off the field. You see how the players are taking care of the chefs we have here, how they're treated every day, the player liaisons, helping them a little thing, get their bank account, get their Social Security phone set up when you come to a new country. Just little details like that,” Bocanegra said.

“Our digital and creative departments as well as our marketing department helped us put together a really cool recruitment packet. So we've got a packet of about 20 pages that we'll send digitally out to players to show not only our facilities and how cool the club is, but the city and schools and daycare and nails and hair salons and all the stuff that you can do the concerts that come through here and really showing like what Atlanta is about. So you hear about LA, Miami, New York, right? Everybody kind of knows those cities. But Atlanta is a pretty darn cool city as well. And so showing and highlighting that has been really useful.”