The Open Cup is a humorous event.
It provides teams with the opportunity to play each other on the pitch humorous event and is the quickest way to a trophy and a position in the Champion’s League.
The event offers both upper level teams the chance to rest their star players and test the subs’ abilities, as well as lower division teams the chance to develop into monster killers.
That simply does not always pay off.
It was Atlanta’s earliest exit from the competition and likely one of the club’s most frustrating performances ever.
That’s not to denigrate Memphis;
Stephen Glass did a good job of preparing the club, and they brought the fight to Kennesaw, as Gonzalo Pineda said in the post-game news conference.
He made reference to the conflict Memphis experienced and Atlanta’s absence of it.
However, Pineda also made a significant point about the team’s overall morale and the club’s expectations during his remarks.
He said that he had given some players opportunities after they demonstrated in practice that they deserved them, and it is now up to them to succeed.
A greater standard is applied to Atlanta United players, he added.
However, despite some strong individual efforts (Clement Diop kept the score manageable, Noah Cobb had a good game, and Franco Ibarra made 10 tackles), the team’s overall lack of cohesion proved to be too much to overcome.
In any case, the Five Stripes have a bitter pill to chew, and supporters can only hope that this served as a wake-up call in the same sense that they hoped it would.
View Pineda, Ronald Hernandez, and Tyler Wolff’s responses below, and don’t forget to leave your own!
