For the past couple of seasons and definitely for most games this season playing for 90 has felt like a struggle for the New England Revolution. It will be great when we can stand at the top of the hill, discuss our game plan, run downhill maybe not perfectly, and arrive at the bottom unscathed and victorious. Too often it feels like we’re running uphill all game long, or most of the game anyway.
After that two-goal DC United comeback for a familiar one-goal loss, the New England Revolution have been eliminated from the 2012 Major League Soccer Cup Playoffs. Our visit to DC United ended with a 2 to 1 loss despite our Revs initially taking the lead. We are a bottom half of the table team. This doesn’t mean we will not make progress but at this point we haven’t made enough. Good teams take all or most of their points at home and go on the road and take points from other teams. Jay Heaps has said it, we are only as good as I record and that’s disappointing.
We’ve definitely seen roster turnover this season which is different and in my opinion improvement over last season. I also don’t think were done learning about the players on our roster this season. Clearly that is the case with Juan Toja and probably the guy who entered the field with him late in the game, down 2-1. Benny Feilhaber returned to the field and both he and Juan Toja immediately improved the Revs attack. Regular starters for most of the season, Chris Tierney and AJ Soares did not see any time in the game.
Chris Pontius’ goal and assist performance deserves respect. This season DC scored seven goals against us while we only scored three against them. Addressing goal differential like this will be important next season through improved play at both ends of the field – but we still have five games left in this season. I will be looking forward to attempting to discern the future of this team. Ahead of the game in DC Jay Heaps said, “It’s always about winning,” even as he admitted that he would be looking to spread minutes around. We’ll see what happens.
(image courtesy of revolutionsoccer.net)
