For Tata Martino and his Atlanta United, as they stepped onto the much-maligned shortened Yankee Stadium, there was one clear plan: contain the New York City FC attack.
They had just seen New York tear through the Philadelphia Union in the knockout round with a series of searing counter-attacks and fluent, attacking moves. They were not to fall into the same, ensnaring trap.
And Martino highlighted one man that his Atlanta players needed to stop from dictating the game if they were to hang onto the coattails of the NYCFC attack, and it was not David Villa.