New England may have seen early season ambition fade into resignation or frustrated disappointment during 2012. The fans in New England also saw some clear improvements. Though many watched the 2-1 loss we suffered in Chicago, both home games in New England were shut out wins for the Revs.
In both games Chicago seemed slow and unable to put together many serious threats to score. A credit to the Revs defensive schemes, execution, and capitalizing on their own chances. Blair Gavin earned his first ever start for the Revs and he combined well with Cyde Simms. Simms late season performances reflect a renewed commitment to leadership and putting in the hard work of defensive positioning and careful distribution. Gavin played a role in our possesion, too. While most of the passes I noted him making were backwards, he showed for the ball, received it under pressure and then made a simple pass to a teammate. Often that teammate was Clyde Simms who then, pressure having been relieved, made a more positive pass and moved play up the field and into attack.
I still don’t like seeing turnovers near midfield that come from attacking players trying to take on too many opponents. Despite those turnovers, and along with the prevention defense that Simms lead in front of our backline, our attack was threatening. Threatening may be a generous adjective, but our Revs were certainly more threatening than the Fire attack. Diego Fagundez’s goal was beautiful to behold. Kelyn Rowe found Diego who dribbled forward while drifting wide right and then cutting back towards goal. The entire time Jerry Bengtson was charging forward pulling the Chicago Fire with him while they tried to figure out what to do about the Revs crashing in on them. With his head up, Diego couldn’t see a pass to Jerry who continued to push towards goal. Sean Johnson, the Fire’s goalie, had moved towards the near post, anticipating a shot for Jerry, perhaps? Diego saw the far post open as he approached the 18 yard line and just rocketed a shot into the net.
Our Revs had capitalized on a scoring opportunity and stifled our opponents offense. This performance, along with the clear difference between our team and the other teams around us in terms of goal differential, bodes well for 2013. Our Revs may have ended up on the wrong side of too many one-goal games this season, hence the poor showing in the wins column and points overall. Our Revs seem close and poised for minimal improvements to possibly have a significant effect on our place in the standings. Heading into next week’s season ending match in Montreal, our Revs have a -6 goal differential. That’s not great, but it isn’t as horrible as Chivas (-34), Portland (-23 before Sunday’s game), or Toronto’s (-25) goal differential this season, either. Beating Chicago was a solid win, for sure, a good sign for the future, and not much more, yet.
(image courtesy of revolutionsoccer.net)
