The first major departure of the offseason has happened. Atlanta United announced today that Bartosz Slisz has completed a permanent transfer to Brøndby IF of the Danish Superliga.
Slisz leaves the club after two seasons in MLS. He made 62 appearances for the Five Stripes during that time, scoring four goals and adding three assists.
Financial details of the deal were not publicly disclosed, but reports out of Europe suggest that the Five Stripes will receive a transfer fee of over three million euros.
That fee would be around the same amount the club paid to bring in the midfielder a few years ago.
While the return on investment would be minimal, the move opens up a significant amount of salary cap space for the club to acquire more players and build the squad to fit Tata Martino’s vision.
Bartek‘s tenure in Atlanta will be remembered as a complicated one. He was always an energetic and passionate figure in the team, no one can question that. What’s debatable was his tangible impact on the squad in relation to his budget charge. No matter your opinion on that topic, it’s clear Slisz gave everything he had to the club when on the field.
There’s still plenty of offseason and silly season remaining to fully judge what the team’s midfield for 2026 will look like. However, as things stand, Steven Alzate and Jay Fortune appear to be the two players to benefit the most from this move. We can only wait and see how the rest of the winter plays out.
Sending Lionel to an early vacation in 2024 was worth every penny.
For me he always had too many key giveaways in the defensive third. He was supposed to help us build from the back, but I never trusted him with the ball near the goal. Also wasn’t he awful at PKs?