Morados picked up a 1-4 away win on Saturday near Atlanta, GA, clinched at least one home playoff game, and found their way into second place in the table thanks to Charlotte Independence. There’s not a lot to be taken away from a game where there’s a 3-0 halftime lead, but there are a few larger points we can recognize if we look closely.

First, in light of some of Jordan Cooper’s complaints on The Final Judgment last week, John Hackworth started what we can probably call City’s Best XI sans Greg Ranjitsingh on Saturday night. Paco and Alexis, Oscar and Kyle, Paolo and Speedy, Cuatro, Niall and Ownby, plus Cam. We might see Ilija replace Niall occasionally depending on the situation as Ilija’s arguably the better creative player, but Niall offers more in defense. I’m guessing this group, with a change in the attacking midfield here and there, is what we’ll be seeing for the remainder of this season and the playoffs.

Atlanta put out a pretty good lineup with Romario Williams, Laurent Kissiedou, Jon Gallagher and Chris Goslin in the fold. Williams has gotten some MLS minutes this season, though it’s hard for literally anyone not named Zlatan or Bradley Wright-Phillips to displace Josef Martinez in that league right now. Chris Goslin will be a first team player for Atlanta at some point, too, and likely will feature with the USMNT during the next World Cup cylcle. We didn’t see Andrew Carleton or George Bello this match, as both seem to be spending more time with the senior team also.

What was left was a group that just couldn’t handle Louisville City. Morados had 57% possession and completed better than 80% of their passes in Twonited’s half. They connected on better than 25% of their 19 crosses. They took 28 shots, 19 in the box, though only six were on target. That’s not very good, but two went in and two more were deflected in by City’s Man of the Match AJ Cochran (sorry, AJ), so all’s well that ends well. I’d like to see a lot better efficiency out of City’s attack, but it’s hard to complain about four goals. Plus, nine City shots were blocked.

Atlanta’s lone tally came off, what else, a counter-attack and score by Romario Williams, who does that. I’ll chalk that up to a momentary lapse in concentration from City, which is bad, but also forgivable given the 0-3 lead at the time. That said, stop it, those kinds of goals are what get you knocked out of the playoffs.

Here’s a full-match heat map that will probably make Hackworth smile:

Atlantwo only had eight touches in Dobro’s 18 all match, while Morados had 32 on the opposite end, including six in Atlanta’s six yard box. It’s honestly hard to explain how City didn’t score even more. Cam had ten of those touches, and two inside the six. He’s got to be frustrated that AJ Cochran scored more than he did. Lancaster took twelve shots all on his own, which is more than Atlanta as a team took all game. Two were on target, four were blocked, AJ stole one from him, and he probably had at least one shout at a penalty as well.

Individually, Paco and Alexis weren’t nearly as busy with the ball as they were against Harrisburg last week. Both did really, really well in duels, winning a combined 16 of 21, and 9-2 in aerials. Alexis actually created four (four!) scoring chances, and took a couple shots to boot.

Not to be outdone, Oscar generated four chances of his own, though Kyle got the glory with his strike for a goal in the 37′. Smith also had five interceptions.

Speedy and Paolo dominated the center of midfield and only missed a handful of passes between them, with both of them completing over 90% overall and in the attacking half. Neither contributed much offensively, but this was one of those games where the fullbacks got much more involved in the attack and and the defensive midfielders sat back a little more. It also helped that Niall played a little bit deeper to help with the midfield triangle, and he was much more of a fulcrum for the offense. It paid off with an assist on Kyle’s goal.

Cuatro and Ownby both put in solid shifts. Ownby had an assist on Cuatro’s goal, which was about as good a pitch-and-catch play as you’ll ever see. Ilija and Jonathan Lewis both did fine in their spot appearances, each creating a couple of chances. Carranza also did fine, and picked up a couple of fouls for his trouble, as he is wont to do.

This was a solid performance, something we can hope to expect out of Morados for the remainder of the run-in. Keep winning and second place is ours. Let’s do it.