What the Atlanta United coach says about Messi and Inter Miami after defeating them

Inter Miami fell for the first time since Lionel Messi arrived at the Florida team. Gerardo Martino's team succumbed to Atlanta United in a match where they started ahead on the scoreboard thanks to a great goal from Leandro Campana. However, things did not go as expected and the local team came back without so many complications. Now, the Atlanta United coach is already reacting to the 5-2 victory against Messi's team.

It should be remembered that Lionel Messi did not have action in this match because he was coming off a minor injury with the Argentine National Team and Gerardo Martino did not want to force him for this match. Jordi Alba also had no action in this match, where the defense certainly had a difficult time. However, despite the absence of Lionel Messi, the Atlanta United coach refused to detract from his team's victory in this match.

In the middle of a press conference, the Mexican revealed that he found out that Leo was not playing because of his pizza publication. Although later he went in depth about his analysis of the match. “We would have achieved a good result even with Messi,” he assured. They also asked him if he used Messi's absence as motivation for his team and the Mexican responded: “No, I felt that the team had spirit and determination to win even if Messi was there. The idea was there and I had confidence.”

What else did Gonzalo Pineda say?

“The intellectual actor is always the players. I rescue the heart and the mentality. It's not easy to come down 1-0 against one of the league's strongest teams and even start the second half with a penalty and make it 3-2, mentally it hits. I think the team showed quite a lot of maturity,” added Pineda. With this result, Atlanta United reached 45 points in Major League Soccer and is placed in sixth place in its conference. Inter Miami is still far from the position that gives access to the postseason, but they still have 7 games to attempt the feat.