This game has unraveled a few of the remaining ideas we Revs fans had about our team. Rebuilding, of course we are. Flawed, sure, we aren’t yet a complete team. The major storyline I thought I had a grip on, though, was that we could defend reasonably well and lacked the offensive punch to finish games. The last part about ‘finishing’ might still be relevant even though Saturday’s loss to the Columbus Crew flipped the script in most other ways.
For most of this 8-game losing streak the Revs failed to score and lost close games. Evidence suggested that scoring might be sufficient to bring some kind of result, close losses turn into ties or even wins. That was my hope, anyway.
Our New England Revolution, however, demonstrated the ability to score in this game. Neutral fans will call the first half exciting or thrilling. Benny Feilhaber’s cross to Ryan Guy in the 10th minute nearly opened up the scoring. Guy has been given the task of crashing forward from midfield and his motor suits that role. He would open the scoring on a nice bit of combination play in the 17th minute: throw-in, flick-on header, Sene drop pass, Kelyn Rowe getting out of the way, Ryan Guy rocket from outside the box.
In the 23rd minute Jerry Bengston clinically finished a great play to give our Revs an early two goal lead. Clyde Simms and Benny worked a bit of space just shy of midfield in the build up. As soon as the opportunity opened, Benny dropped a weighted pass down the field. The Columbus defense seemed to disappear as Jerry raced onto the ball. He arrived before Gruenenbaum – this play made their keeper look desperate – a nifty turn, and a shot right off the near post to beat the finally arriving defenders for his second New England goal.
After two goals the first half scoring wasn’t done. Our defense, for a change, could not keep this game from sliding away. By the 32nd minute the game was tied. Higuain is quite the addition to the league. So, as Steve Davis pointed out on Twitter, the rest of MLS should learn from the Revs errors and not foul Columbus within 30 yards of goal. He curled a great ball over our wall to elude Matt Reis. Their other recent addition, Arrieta, who is constantly testing the offsides line as in this case, broke in for the second. Their third goal was almost a symmetrical copy of the first – everyone, don’t give Higuain a free kick within range, got it?
In the second half we seemed to run out of ideas. The ball moved faster, but through the arir and not with quick, short passes. Diego Fagundez may have submitted his best shift of 2012 – nice to see energy and production similar to the spark he brought us last year. One of those long balls from the back found Diego out in front. He drew a foul in the 80th minute that another sub, Lee Nguyen put away. We tied the game. Fernando Cardenas also came in and did what a late sub with wheels is supposed to do pressing their tired defenders. Our Revs didn’t give up and scoring three goals is a notable improvement given the way the last two months have gone.
The result, however, turned on the fact that Columbus didn’t give up either. In the 85th Arrieta again broke into space behind our backline and between our center backs for the seventh goal of the game and the winner. We made Columbus look like a scoring machine.
So, this result does unravel several of my beliefs abut this Revs team. The close losses and scoring drought lead me to believe that with goals wins would come. After this game all of the discussion on twitter focused on our porous defense. This loss has us teetering on the edge of mathematical elimination from the playoffs. It’s a different type of let down because we did score, but not enough apparently. Oh, and Shalrie returns Wednesday. We were on the wrong end of a seven goal game, well last night Chivas USA was on the wrong end of an eight goal game. The goats lost 6-2 to Seattle. Perhaps Chivas futility and the Revs futility will combine in our favor?
(image courtesy of Getty Images)
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