“Back to Basics,” has been the catchcry for John Herdman and Toronto FC.

Whenever the team has hit a rough patch, Herdman has urged his side to return to those principles upon which they began this journey. It echoed once more after last weekend’s 3-0 defeat away to the New York Red Bulls.

“It's got to be a tight team, front-to-back, side-to-side, when we attack and defend,” laid out Herdman of those foundations on Thursday. “It's commitment: that when we go forward, we've got to be smart with the defensive transition, close up the channels that we know Atlanta can expose. It's that level of simplicity, a genuine effort from everyone.”

“When we attack, we attack as one. When we defend, we defend as one and we maintain a tight structure,” he continued. “And then the second part of that is our identity, that aggressive identity.”

“We talked about this collectively, that it was a bit too passive and the opportunities to really hunt back, get the team to step together, to stifle the opposition, to get pressure on the opposition,” Herdman highlighted. “Over stretches of games you can often get away from those basics, things that we were doing well in our identity, so we talked about being organized and aggressive – our distances have been too big and we've been hunting in singles, but not packs.”

It’s a simple yet effective reminder.

“That's a good way to put it,” reflected Aimé Mabika. “When you think about how we started the season where we weren't scoring as much, but we were living off getting results by being a tough team to beat, getting clean-sheets – first three games of the season were clean-sheets – and recently, obviously, we're giving up way too many goals.”

“When you're giving up as many goals as we have, it's always going to make it tough to win games and get results in this league,” he continued. “That's the first thing: can we become that team that we had been early in the season? Making sure we're never getting too ahead of ourselves and getting back to the foundations of the system. That will help us get our bearings and then we can kick on again.”

Saturday’s match away to Atlanta United, the final game of June, leads into a gruelling stretch in July. Five games in MLS and the first leg of the semifinal series against Forge FC in the Canadian Championship will see TFC in action every few days.

It’s an important stretch. MLS pauses for the Leagues Cup at the end of the month and when action resumes in August only eight matches will remain in the 2024 regular season.

“The first thing to do is to get back on track,” underlined Mabika. “John spoke about us having clarity and understanding what this season has meant so far – when you've lost three games on the bounce, it's easy to forget that.”

“It’s understanding all the good things we've done this year up to this point: the clean-sheets, the results on the road, the strides that we've made as a team. We've had a little – we like to call it just ‘a bump on our journey’ – so first and foremost is to get back to the basics and start getting some results to go our way,” he continued. “These next six games will be vital to put us in a position where, as we come out of Leagues Cup, we're within touching distance of our goals for the season.”

Every side will experience dips over the course of a season – TFC knew they would not avoid this reality, but it does not overshadow the progress that has been made.

“We know, and as I've signalled to the guys, you’re two games away from playing in a final of a Canadian Championship, you’re 14 games away from being in the MLS playoffs and playing for MLS Cup, and we’re six games away from starting the Leagues Cup,” reminded Herdman. “We're right there; we’re right there.”

“The key to everything is the commitment to living above that line as we approach this next game, which is Atlanta, and then, as a starting point, making sure that there's a performance we're proud of,” he urged. “That's the start: 90 minutes we're proud of, a real performance where everyone's contributing, the mindset is right. And then we're on the roll again, back-to-back-to-back-to-back games.”

“[Jonathan] Osorio, [Richie] Laryea, [Sean] Johnson will be back during that phase (the Copa América Final is set for July 14), we’ll have the summer window open which should give us a chance to strengthen the squad, Shane O’Neil's about to come back, Brandon Servania will be coming back during that period of time, Tyrese Spicer will hopefully be back during that period, Lorenzo [Insigne]'s building fitness,” Herdman listed. “There's a lot of good things right on our horizon. We're right there. We're right there to play for three bits of silverware.”

The next game is the most important one. Standing in Toronto’s way will be Atlanta, who made a coaching change at the start of the month with the departure of Gonzalo Pineda. Rob Valentino has stepped in as interim manager.

Atlanta are unbeaten in three since, drawing at home against the Houston Dynamo, before defeating D.C. United on the road and last weekend playing to a 1-1 draw away to St. Louis CITY SC.

“It's a bit of unknown,” assessed Herdman of this weekend’s opponent. “They've been shifting into a back five in the last couple of games, the away matches. They played at home in a back four with their traditional identity, so we've got to be ready to adapt to whatever they decide to put out there structurally.”

“And then it’s [Thiago] Almada, everything that they do well, centres around him. He's able to bring the best out of his teammates and they bring the best out of him,” he cautioned. “There's a big emphasis on the work that you do to stop Almada, to deny him, starve him. There's been some attention on that this week.”

“And then ultimately they have a great atmosphere in that stadium. Their home form has cost them a little bit and what I'm hearing is they want to bring that fight back to their home environment and be more difficult to beat,” Herdman added. “So I'm assuming there will be a little bit more emphasis on a more pragmatic or defensive display. We’ve got to be ready to attack, be brave there, and bring our identity.”

Almada’s five goals lead the way for Atlanta, especially with Giorgos Giakoumakis’ transfer to Cruz Azul in Liga MX. Saba Lobjanidze, four goals and four assists, will miss the match, currently in Germany as Georgia faces Spain in the Round of 16 at the 2024 UEFA European Championships, but Jamal Thiaré, four goals, and full-back Brooks Lennon, five assists, are both available.

“They have some really dangerous players,” noted Mabika. “There's been some changes from the last time we played them, but they pose some threats.”

“And then especially playing in their stadium – everyone around the league knows what it's like to play in Mercedes-Benz Stadium against Atlanta,” he closed. “It should be a really good test for us.”