TOTSSF Atal

Day 1602 of lockdown? Do you ever look at the opponent’s squad and already know you are in for a battle before the match begins?  And for me it is not a complete META squad or that they have the most expensive team available.  Honestly, when I see the likes of Gullit, R9, TOTY Mbappé or Cruyff I do not flinch, nor worry.  I know, and always feel like I can wrap these players up and have a good chance of winning.  However, when I see FUT Bday Mbappé, Headliner Neymar, POTM Ben Yedder, and oddly SS Atal I feel like if my opponent has any skill at all it is game over for me.  These cards give me an absolute headache and SS Atal is definitely the outlier of the bunch in terms of price.  I don’t know what it is but he simply torches me for goals every time I play.  So the Ligue 1 TOTSSF was my opportunity to exact some revenge and get the Algerian Sniper into my squad.  I placed a MARKSMAN on Atal and played him as the Left ST in my 4-4-2 formation.  If you follow me on Twitter @IVIaeday  you will already know that he had a great weekend, but we need to look at some of the issues as well.  In the end, Atal was Mr. Nice guy all weekend in the following squad: 
 

Overall

Rating: 9.5/10
Pace Rating: 9.7/10
Dribbling Rating: 9.7/10
Shooting Rating: 9.8/10
Passing Rating: 9/10
Physical Rating: 9/10
Defending Rating: N/A

Again with Atal, we have the same issue with games played on the stats picture.  I only played 20 matches (2 early D/C) and so Atal finished with 24 goals and 9 assists in 20 matches.  Here is what I found out this Weekend League.  If I was better than my opponent Atal was an absolute monster and scored bags full of goals.  Atal had matches of 4 and 5 goals and really can put opponents to bed.  The 5 STAR WEAK FOOT is so key, his left foot is incredible, and he was just about identical on either foot … the 99 FINISHING & 97 SHOT POWER = a lethal combination.  However, I do say just about identical because it became evident early on that Atal LOVES to hit the bar with his left foot.  It got to a comical level at one point and moved to a more anger fueled rage as the games progressed.  I can think of two matches where I lost 2-3 and in both cases Atal had the tieing goal sitting on his left foot, only to end up in misery.  Part user error I am sure, but still a note I made with this card.  Another area of focus was the 99 ACCELERATION & 96 SPRINT SPEED, which are slightly misleading but he is still quick enough to cause the majority of defenders a problem.  
    

Linkability 

Linkability Rating: 3.5/5

While Atal has a lot of options he can now link to in Ligue 1, the ability to create hybrids around him proves difficult.  Honestly I was hoping he would be a central option and I could get Atal and Mahrez in the same squad, but it required a formation or off-chemistry set up that I did not want to use.  

End Game Strength

End Game Strength Rating: 4.5/5

Atal is a specialist when it comes to scoring goals.  He has the pace, he has the shooting, and then there is the dribbling.  4 STAR SKILLS, 99 AGILITY, 92 BALANCE, 98 BALL CONTROL & 99 DRIBBLING… the ball sticks, Atal moves, defenders lunge, and like a magician, the ball vanishes from their sight.  This combination made me think early on that I might set the goal record for a review as Atal dismantled my opponents.  I was loving how he could create his own space and goals in the middle of a highly contested Weekend League.  However, than the competition ramped up and Atal started to slowly fall off of the radar… not completely… but certainly not dominant.  A key reason for this is that as you gain more wins the depth of your opponents gets further and further back until all 11 men are standing on the goal line.  With that, creating goals is one thing, but you have to facilitate them as well.  I found Atal’s passing extremely underwhelming and it really showed near the end of the review.  While I loved the MARKSMAN on this card for the shooting, strength, and dribbling… I am not sure if a DEADEYE is not better suited.  Yet, then you lose all of the MARKSMAN goodness.  This is where I started to move away from the fact that Atal is the true cream of the crop option I originally thought.  He will definitely be able to hold his own but is not a 5/5 in my mind.

Value/Coins & Good vs. Bad 

Value/Coins Rating: 5/5
Good vs Bad Rating: 4/5

For around a million coins this card is perfect value.  The Ultimate TOTSSF will likely lower this price even further to insane value for coins… but until then you easily get a million coins plus worth of quality here.

All that is left is the physicality of this card, and it drops the Good vs. Bad Rating to a 4/5 and so you can guess where this is going.  At 5’9 (176cm) with 87 STRENGTH I was hoping Atal would have that nice pocket of balance and strength that can make smaller cards into tiny boulders barreling down the pitch.  This was not the case for Atal and again as games became more challenging he lost the ball more and more as defenders laid a hand to him.  As a positive side note: I should mention that with the 98 AGGRESSION and 82 overall defending (residue from his original RB base card), that Atal is a machine at winning the ball high up the pitch and did create 4-5 goals from his tenacity defending off of the ball.

Closing Words

So, where does this card fall in the grand scheme of things?  The idea with this review is… would you reconfigure your team to get this card into your squad?  Because if you do not have a Ligue 1 squad to begin with this is the reality.  My immediate advice is, not quite.  Don’t get me wrong this card is a strong option and you will score a ton of goals with him in your squad… but he is not the ultimate game changer that you “have to have.”  One final note though, I can’t deny that this card is quite fun to use (minus the incessant bar rattling) and I did find myself chuckling at some of the outrageous finishes this card produced.  In the end, if you are dead set on trying this card the final question I always get asked is, “do you have any concerns about me moving my squad around to get this lad into the starting 11?” My response in this case… none Atal.  
Cheers for reading.
 

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