NFL: NO Saints 31 Atlanta Falcons 21 recap and analysis

The Saints had a very convincing first drive moving the ball down field thanks to a balanced offense made by short passes and powerful runs where the o-line got the job done, they scored a TD on a  aggressive typical Ingram's run who broke a tackle to reach the end zone. Saints defense played so tough and on the second Falcons offensive drive they forced them to punt from a bad field position and special teamer Mauti not only blocked the punt but returned it to the end zone for a Saints' TD. Atlanta's offense found their pace on the following drive marching easy down field with an high average of yards gained by play on both passing and running game thanks to an improvement of the o-line and that resulted in a Roddy White's on a crossing route after a play action fake. The Falcos made another similar drive and seemed to could tie the game early but rookie HB Coleman after a very good outside run lost the football an Browner came up with it saving at least 3 points. The same exact thing happened some minutes later when the center Ston made one of the worst snap i have ever seen that resulted in a fumble recovered by Ellerby inside Saints' redzone. 

After a quite first half of the third quarter the Saints put together an effective drive on the air that fell a lil bit short of the end zone due to a lack of running support so Hocker made a FG from the 31 year line. On their following drive Brees continued to be on fire and so on his TE Watson but like last drive once close to the end zone they started to have problems due too poor running efficiency and on a 4th down and 4 they went for it with a massive formation who fooled the Falcons defense that were so committed to try to stop the run that when Brees passed to Watson on a play action he was alone in the end zone to score a TD. The Falcons reaction came with a no huddle offense drive started by passing the ball and ended by HB Freeman with a stretch run on the weak side resulted in a 25 yards TD. The Saints decided to be aggressive and not just chew the clock and they chose right doing that because at the end of it the found the end zone again with a powerful short yardage run by Ingram that ended Atlanta's chances of a comeback

Very good performance by the Saints especially we saw a great improvement since last week in Philly especially thanks to the great job that the o-line made on both passing and running game, Brees has been great as always and this time he found in Watson who had a career night a reliable target, something that he didn't have in last weeks. The Saints defense played a good game and they have been very opportunistic on the mistakes of the Falcons' offense, have been those mistake to let the visitors lose along with a poor performance by Julio Jones who hasn't been able to get open free in time, a positive note came from Freeman who had another r very good game running off tackles with pitch, stretch and counter runs. The Falcons' defense played good against the run but as last season they have been too vulnerable on the air.

MVP: Brees and Watson